


Stalwart and Steady and True

by DrOlShakes



Series: Out of Time [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Captain America - All Media Types, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Comic Book action and violence, F/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Robb Stark as Captain America, Sandor Clegane as Russian ex-assassin, Stark Siblings as the Howling Commandos, non-canon lineage
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-18 23:05:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 77,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3587412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrOlShakes/pseuds/DrOlShakes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a lifetime of work, Ned and Catelyn Stark successfully create a serum that will create the perfect supersoldier. On the brink of World War 2, they administer the serum to their five children. Robb Stark goes to Europe and becomes Captain America, his siblings at his side as the fearless Howling Commandos.</p><p>In 1945, Sansa and Arya Stark are caught in an explosion that sends Sansa plummeting into the Arctic Ocean.</p><p>In 2012, her body is found. She wakes up.</p><p>AKA The Captain America!au that nobody asked for</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prelude: Hanging on the Old Barbed Wire

**Author's Note:**

> This work is unbetaed. I stake no claim to any of these characters and own none of them. Even if a lot of them own my heart. This fic is already mostly written and a way for me to indulge in two if my favorite characters: Sansa Stark and good ol' Captain America. Enjoy!

There was a baseball game playing on the radio, a familiar one. Sunlight filtered through her eyelids and she cracked them open, glancing around. White walls, a counter, hospital bed, soft sheets, softer than she was used to. The scores of the baseball game…

Sansa looked closer. The room was clean, and she was alone. She had woken up alone. Panic flared through her. She was a Stark and Starks didn’t wake up alone, not in hospitals, not in the war. She swung her legs out of the bed and _who had put her in a dress_? She pulled herself out of the bed and made her way to the door. Before she could reach it, a woman walked through it. Sansa stopped short. The woman looked off. Hair too curly and long, brassier shaped wrong. And the game…

“Where am I?” Sansa asked, her voice hard.

“You’re in New York, in a recovery house,” the woman answered, her voice calm and smile gentle but still somehow off.

Sansa paused, taking it in. She’d been…she’d been with Arya, a fortress in the Arctic, there’d been a plane and Arya had-

“Where am I really?” Sansa asked, drawing herself up, pulling her muscles taught.

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” the woman was good, her smile still calm, but Sansa could see it twitch.

“That game is from 1941. I know. I was there,” Sansa said. She stepped towards the woman, whose smile finally fell.

“Sergeant Stark-“ the woman began and three armed men burst into the room. Sansa charged, throwing one into the wall. It broke easily, nothing more than drywall, and she threw the others out after him. Cursing the dress, Sansa leapt over the men and through the hole she’d made. The outside room was cavernous, more like a warehouse and unlike any army bunker she’d been in. She scanned the room quickly; no more armed men, no snipers, and one exit. She burst through it.

Tall glass windows and a crowded hallway. The clothing was unfamiliar- not a White Walker base, unlikely to be Allied either though. Side door, probable stairwell. She went through it. Four stories. She leapt the railing, landing soft and rolling with it. There was a door. It was locked, but weak enough to break through and then she could see the street outside.

Sansa ran through the glass doors and it was loud, so _loud_ , outside. Cars sped down the street and she took off running. Flashing lights, honking, a heavy odor in the air- she ran until she found herself in a familiar place. It was Times Square, she’d know it anywhere, Brooklyn born and bred like she was, but how it could actually be- four huge black cars pulled up and surrounded her, men in all black filing out. She turned to run again, body tensed for action when-

“Sergeant Stark!” a voice called, and it was unmistakably military. It brought her to a halt and she turned, eyes scanning the crowd. She found the man who called to her- it was obvious- long black coat, eye patch, stood like steel, dangerous- but she kept looking beyond him. Others had filed out of the cars, dressed in all black with helmets on, guns drawn on her. Beyond that there were at least two others watching her dressed as civilians, all of them concealing weapons. Probably at least another three that she couldn’t see. She turned back to the man, keeping her body ready for action.

“At ease, soldier,” he said when he reached her. Sansa recognized it for the order it was but refused to follow it. He sighed when he noticed she hadn’t changed her stance. “Look,” he began, his voice sounding weary, “I’m sorry about that little charade back there but we thought it best to break it to you slowly.”

Sansa couldn’t control her breaths, they were heaving, her chest rising and falling. She was trying her best to quell the rising panic inside of her, to stamp down that intense unease, “Break what?” she bit out, her voice sharp.

The man sighed again, “You’ve been asleep, Sergeant.” He paused and Sansa’s heart stuttered. “For nearly 70 years.”

She stumbled back and her knees almost buckled. Her air rushed out of her and she clenched her fists. Sansa’s mind wanted to push it away, label it the impossibility that it should have been but that word had meant so little to her for the past four years that now…she looked around at the speeding cars, the garish advertisements, at Times Square that was Times Square but not _her_ Times Square and-

Sansa forced herself to silence the whimper growing in her chest. Instead, she drew herself up, squared her shoulders.

“You going to be alright?” The man asked and Sansa wanted to laugh at the ridiculousness of the question.

“Yeah,” she answered, trying to ground herself. And then, the panic came back because what if-“The rest of us?”

Brann and Rickon and Robb and _Arya_. Were they- “The rest of the Howling Commandos?”

Sansa forced herself to nod, her throat a death grip around her voice.

“I’m sorry, Sergeant. You’re the last one.” It may have been kindness in his eye as he said it, but in that moment Sansa _hated_ him.

              

**

“What are you going to do, when the war’s over?”

It was every reporter’s favorite question for the Howling Commandos, for Captain America. Robb always smiled, eyes down cast, just slightly self-depreciating: “Move on to the next fight, I imagine. Keep the world free.” That was the answer that always made the papers; the folks back home loved the idea of the Sentinel of Liberty carrying on, carrying his torch across the world.

Around their campfires, the answers went a little different. In the middle of nowhere, Austria this time, behind enemy lines, the five Starks, the Howling Commandos, answered the question.

“I’m gonna be a doctor.” Bran said. “Help find cures and vaccines. Just help people.”

“Park Ranger,” Rickon answered, shoulders tight. “Don’t much care where, so long as it’s quiet.” Sometimes Sansa thought that the war had hit him the hardest. It was easy to forget sometimes, during all the fighting, just how young he was.

“How about you, Robb? What are ya really gonna do?” Arya asked, head rolling in his direction.

“There’s some groups I want to meet with, people talkin’ about getting equal rights for folks. I want to help ‘em, if I can.” It made Sansa smile. Robb Stark, Captain America, carrying that torch for freedom, but maybe not quite in the way that the world expected.

“Sansa?” Bran asked, smile on his lips too.

“Oh, please. We _all_ know what Sansa’s gonna do,” Arya broke in, flipping herself on her mat to look at her sister. “She’s gonna marry Willas, get a house in Jersey and pop out some kids. Hell, they’ll probably invite us over for barbeques.”

Sansa blushed because it _was_ what she wanted, at least most of it: “Arya, I will _never_ move to New Jersey and I’m offended that ya would even suggest somethin’ like that.” She and her siblings shared a grimace; they were New Yorkers to the bone.

“What about you, Arya? Any big plans?” Sansa asked. Her sister fell quiet, pulling out a knife, twirling it lazily. They all turned to look at her, each noting the shadow on Arya’s face. It’d been like that since they’d started finding the camps.

“Dunno,” she finally answered. “SSR might need me. Guess I’ll just stick around and see what comes next.” Arya said it with a feigned lightness, something that anyone who her knew her less, anyone not a Stark, wouldn’t notice.

It was a quiet night after that. Robb took first watch like he always did, his shield next him and the firelight casting its shadows. Sansa went into her tent, put the knife under her pillow and the Colt by the bed roll. Maybe she’d dream of Willas. She’d probably dream about the White Walker base though, about hard straps and a lab table, and the empty void. They were all she dreamed about now and it did nothing to quiet the small voice in her head, the one that believed that she would never get out the war, that she wasn’t going to have an _after_.

She hoped she’d dream of Willas.

 

**

Sansa had slit her first throat in 1942 behind a bombed out building in Paris. It wasn’t the first man that she’d killed, but it was the first one that got blood on her hands. She hadn’t even realized it until later when she was cleaning her knife back in their rented room and trying to remember when she had used it. Clinging to the porcelain toilet, Sansa vomited because she couldn’t believe that she’d forgotten, even for a moment, the slick way the blood had seeped between her fingers.

The next day, when she and Arya were picking off straggling White Walker agents in a dark alley, the ones who survived the frontal assault, Sansa made sure no blood got on her. She’d learned that it was hard to wash out.

**

“You and Arya shouldn’t be the ones doing this,” Robb whispered, and Sansa was sick of the old argument. “You shouldn’t have to go first, shouldn’t have to...” he trailed off, not willing to say the words.

Sansa turned to him, sliding her last knife into its sheath. “You can’t do the dirty work, Cap.” He had the _image_ to preserve, but more than that, he had the ideals.

Arya stepped up beside her, quiet as the shadows around them. She put her hand on Sansa’s shoulder; she was ready.

“I worry about what this is doing to you two. What the war is-“ Robb tried to say before Sansa cut him off. “We’ll go in through the basement, clear the bottom floors as fast as we can. Once we locate the weapons’ hatch, Direwolf will blow the fuses. Soon as the lights cut, you three will charge in, round up what’s left.”

“But-“

“The mission is to capture Craster. All other objectives secondary,” Sansa continued, strapping down her boots.

“I know the mission!” Robb hissed, mindful of the need for quiet.

Sansa and Arya both turned to look at him. “Then do your part, Cap. We’ll do ours.” Their eldest brother opened his mouth again to argue, but stopped and gave a resigned nod.

“Commandos, get into position,” he ordered the rest of them, walking away to grab his shield.

“Don’t see much difference between slitting a man’s throat behind his back and shooting him in the face, anyway,” Arya muttered as they made their way into the woods. Silently, Sansa agreed.

**

He led her across the dance floor, a smooth path even in the crowded room. She’d gotten to wear her green dress and it was swishing around her knees. Willas couldn’t lindy hop, not with his leg, but she liked dancing with him anyway. Later, they’d sit in his car awhile and he’d kiss her, the moon bright over them, and she’d forget that they’d had to find a new dancehall because the old one hadn’t survived the most recent raid.

But for now, the shandy was delicious and she’d managed to get some time alone with her fella. The band wasn’t the best either, but they could carry a tune. Maybe the city was different, but Sansa supposed that dancehalls had to be something universal, whether they were in London or Brooklyn. Willas was laughing, his head thrown back and his eyes crinkled. Sansa smiled back and maybe it wasn’t as full as it used to be, but at least it was there.

**

There were seven more men on this level of the White Walker base. She had three minutes to clear it. Three knives, a garrote wire and her Colt pistol. One smoke bomb in case of emergency. Sansa took off down the corridor.

Three men in the passage. She threw two knives, the men fell. She had to disarm the third man before breaking his neck. She grabbed her knives. 45 seconds gone. Ran again. One man around the corner; she threw a knife in the hand that’d been reaching for his gun, pulled another across his throat. 90 seconds. Three men stationed in front of the prisoners’ ward. Three bullets. 30 seconds to disarm the bomb. 120 seconds. Clear.

There were 12 prisoners in the cell, most of them children. It made Sansa sick, looking at their wounds, at the way their eyes were hollow and their skin pale. There were needle marks in their arms and they were so similar to the ones that she’d gotten in ‘43 that bile rose in her throat and she had to force it down. When she moved towards the cell, the children backed away. Sansa looked at the lock; she could pick it but it’d just waste time. Instead she grabbed the iron bars and yanked, the hinges cracking and the cell door coming off. She tossed it aside.

“Do you speak English?” she asked the eldest looking child; a young woman who was maybe 16. The girl shook her head.

“Deutsch?”

The girl nodded.

Nodding her head, Sansa told them she was there to get them out. Robb, Arya and Rickon were clearing the rest of the base while Bran watched the perimeter through his scope. Sansa needed to clear the prisoners and then Rickon would set their own explosives. By then Arya would have hijacked the truck they’d seen out front and they could leave, blow the base and radio in. A simple rescue and clean up op.

The children followed her out and Sansa wished she could shield the youngest ones from the bodies she’d left in her wake. But they had been in a White Walker camp. They had seen worse. Sansa led them through the maze of corridors, up, up and out until she kicked the back door open, sunlight breaking in. Outside, she could see her sister in the cab of the truck, fiddling with the wires. Rickon was setting the last of the detonators. Robb came towards them, balancing a bulky piece of machinery on his shoulder; some White Walker tech for the SSR scientists to look at. Bran would be out in the forest somewhere waiting for pick up. Robb had given the all-clear, had radioed in. All they had to do was blow the base-

Sansa almost didn’t see it, a slight bit of movement off to her right. She turned- and then the children were screaming. Their bodies jerked, spasms shaking through them. She rushed towards them, feeling helpless, and behind her she heard the unmistakable sound of Captain America’s shield singing through the air. Then there was a dull thud that she could only hear over the sound of the screaming because of the serum in her veins.

The children dropped and Sansa fell to her knees beside the youngest; a small boy with dirty brown curls. A ringlet had fallen over his eyes. They were still open. She wanted to brush the hair back. She didn’t.

“Shit shit shit! I thought we were clear! We shoulda been clear!” Rickon roared, his anger breaking to the surface.

“Where the fuck did this guy come from!” Arya shouted and Sansa heard her sister leave the truck, run over in the direction of where she’d seen the movement. All the children had died with their eyes still open. Sansa knew that she’d have to wait before she could close them; it took hours before that was possible. Otherwise, they’d just pop back open.

The sound of a foot kicking a body, heavy. That was Rickon’s foot. A groan- that must have been the White Walker agent. The sound of a knife getting pulled from a sheath; Arya’s. Robb picked up his shield.

“Put the cuffs on him. He’ll come back with us.” Robb’s voice was heavy and _tired_. Sansa could hear how tired he was. He usually hid it better than this.

“Take him back! Cap, look at what he did. We oughta kill this fucker!” Rickon protested, the chaos in him rising up.

“Stand down, Wilding.” Robb’s voice was firm.

“Fuck that! This guy just killed those kids. They were just kids!”

“And we don’t know how he did it,” Robb responded, calm and commanding; his Captain’s voice.

“He’s holding a remote,” Arya interjected, her voice cold where Rickon’s was hot, where Robb’s was steel.

Sansa looked closer at the bodies and cursed under her breath for not noticing it sooner. Each of the children had a subcutaneous lump on their wrist. Steeling herself, Sansa took the little boy’s arm and dug a knife under the skin, digging out the object. It was some sort of conductor, she realized, meant to send electricity through the body. To punish them, she figured. To stop an escape. To stop them from answering any questions.

“We should kill him. You know we should, Cap.” A part of Sansa, a small part that she tried so hard to ignore, agreed with her youngest brother.

“We don’t just kill people. We take them in for questioning.”

“But-“

“That’s enough,” Sansa said, making her voice carry. She stood again, finally turning away from the children to face her family. “Cuff him and gag him, Direwolf. Cap’s right. He has answers that we need, now that we can’t ask the prisoners.” Arya nodded, pulling the reinforced handcuffs from her belt.

Sansa walked towards Robb, dropping the little device in his hand, blood still on it. Their eyes met and he nodded before pocketing it.

“Wilding, set the detonator. We’re going. We need to rendezvous with Crow and get to the pick-up.” Robb said brusquely, securing his shield on his back, once again picking up the piece of machinery.

“What about the-“ Rickon paused, stuttering over the word ‘children,’ “bodies?” he finished, voice going hard.

“We can’t take them. There’s no room for just bodies. We’ll notify command back at base,” Sansa spoke quietly, forcing her lip not to quiver.

Rickon looked like he wanted to fight it and even Robb paused before loading the tech in the truck. Neither of them said anything though and Arya just finished gagging their prisoner before hauling him up and pushing him towards their ride. Both she and Robb climbed in after him. Sansa turned to look at her youngest brother.

He stood tall, back straight and had a tension in his shoulders that shouldn’t be there for someone so young. He was holding the detonator like it could bring him salvation. It made Sansa’s heart ache for him and not for the first time, she wondered if her parents had been right to give him the serum when he was only 16, war be damned. He’d been eager though, to be like the rest of them. To be like Robb. She watched him, taller than all of them, broader than Robb even, and he looked so small, even after four years at war. Maybe especially because of those years.   

“Wilding,” she called softly, even if she wanted to call his name instead. He turned to her and she nodded towards the truck. He blinked at her before climbing into the front passenger seat. She followed him, getting behind the wheel. The back of the truck was silent. Sansa started the car and pulled out onto the dirt road leading back into the forest. Rickon took a breath. He pressed the detonator.

None of them flinched when the explosion came.

**

“You really gonna marry him, Sans?” Rickon asked as they danced. Sansa glanced over at Willas who was leaning against the bar, uniform impeccable. His smile was easy and his eyes unburdened.

She took a moment to answer: “You don’t think I should.”

Rickon spun her out and back, flipped her over his arm. The moves were practiced; precise but without any of the passion. He brought her around into a six count. “He doesn’t understand about the war.” Sansa nodded her head. “It doesn’t touch him, not when he’s doin’ just the research and logistics.”

Sansa looked back over at Willas. Their eyes met and he raised his whisky to her and smiled. She slipped one on and returned it. “He doesn’t have to understand it. He shouldn’t have to.”

“He has to understand _you_.” Rickon said, voice quiet and full of heavy meaning.

**

Private Rodriguez was sobbing, his guts spilling out. The mission had gone completely FUBAR and Sansa could hear Arya on the radio, trying to arrange an emergency evac. Private Rodriguez was howling and if he didn’t stop soon then the White Walkers were going to find them and the evac wouldn’t matter.

“Please!” he was screaming, again and again, even as Bran tried to stop the bleeding. Sansa knew it wasn’t going to work.

“White Walkers, 2 o’clock. Coming fast.” Rickon whispered, not even flinching when Private Rodriguez screamed again.

“We need to get out of here,” Robb whispered, glancing in the direction Rickon indicated. Sansa looked too, her enhanced vision allowing her to see the agents that were still far away but gaining.

"We’re not going anywhere, not with him like this,” Bran answered, working as fast as he could. Sansa could see the frenzy in his eyes and knew that, when this private died, it would be another death that he blamed himself for.

“They’re getting closer. No long range weaponry, standard White Walker gear.” Rickon reported.

“Evac three clicks from here, ready for immediate take off,” Arya said, stashing the radio in a pack. “We need to move before any White Walkers find it.”

“We can’t move him!” Bran said, too loud.

“Crow, he’s not going to make it,” Sansa said, moving away from Rickon’s side. She crouched beside Private Rodriguez and met his eyes.

His screams died down and Sansa could see the pain in his eyes, the _pleading_. “Please,” he whimpered.

“Okay,” Sansa whispered to him.

“Little Bird, what are you doing?” Bran asked, his voice bristling.

Sansa didn’t look away from the man. “Close your eyes, soldier,” Sansa said, putting on a gentle smile. “It’ll be over soon.” Private Rodriguez closed his eyes and she stroked his cheek before-

“What are you-“

Moving quickly, Sansa snapped the soldier’s neck.

“No!” Bran yelled, forgetting how close the White Walkers were getting. Sansa could feel all of her siblings looking at her, knew their eyes would be large and alarmed, all except for Arya’s. “He would have- I could have-“

Sansa rose after pulling off Private Rodriguez’s dog tags; “We need to move, now.” Robb looked at her a moment longer before shaking himself and walking away from them, and Rickon moved with him.

Sansa turned to join them before being shoved to her stomach when Bran tackled her to the ground. He yanked her around, raising his fist up to hit her. “I could have done it! I was going to save him! I could have done it!” He brought the fist down and Sansa let it hit her. The blow hit her hard and she knew the bruise would last for at least the night. “You can’t kill everyone!” He cried. Bran tried to swing again but then Robb was hauling him off of her, holding him back.

Rounding on Bran, Robb hissed, “We don’t have time for this. Those White Walkers are going to be here any minute and we need to _move_.” Quieter, he continued, “There was nothing you could have done.”

Sansa could see the fight drain out of her brother. His shoulders slumped and he let his head fall forward. Pushing herself off of the ground, Sansa turned away from her brothers. She’d done what she could to take the blame of Private Rodriguez’s inevitable death off of Bran’s shoulders. He couldn’t save everyone, even if he hadn’t realized that yet, even after all these years at war. Sansa wiped the blood off of her split lip, and pulled of the private's dogtags, refusing to look at his face. It'd be in her nightmares anyway.

Later, back at base, Sansa sat in her tent, not seeing the words of her book. She wasn’t seeing anything. Time slipped by and Sansa couldn’t make herself close her eyes. She’d tried to imagine Brooklyn and her favorite dancehall but she could only see the shell of a Paris bar. She’d tried to remember the way that Arya’s stew smelled in their old apartment, but kept getting it confused with the burned smell of the coffee they made out in the field.

Distantly, Sansa registered the tent flap open, heard the barely-there sounds of Arya coming in from the briefing. Her sister made noise as she moved around the tent, something that she did on purpose. Both Arya and Sansa had learned how to move silently. It had become a default. Now, though, Arya was doing Sansa the kindness of letting her know she wasn’t alone.

After settling herself down on her own cot, Sansa’s sister turned to look at her. “You did the right thing, ya know.” She said it quietly and Sansa was shocked that Arya had spoken at all. Sansa just nodded. She had done what was necessary. Bran would realize that eventually. “He just wants to save the whole world,” Arya continued. “Always has.”

“He shouldn’t be here,” Sansa spoke up. “He should be at school, learnin’ how to be a doctor.”

“Yeah,” Arya whispered. “But he ain’t. He’s here in this shithole with the rest of us.”

“It’s where he thinks he needs to be. He wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, even if he should be. Same with Rickon. And Robb’s been fightin’ for people his whole life. There was no way he’d sit this war out.”

“You know you shouldn’t be here either, right?” Arya asked quietly.

Sansa turned her eyes towards her sister, surprised at the question. She’d never thought about it. “I got Ma and Pa’s serum, just like all of you.”

“You were never made for war,” Arya pushed on. “Not like, not like me. You never wanted the fight.”

Sansa couldn’t argue with that. But when the time came, and her parents offered her the serum, Sansa had known it was the right thing to do. She may not have wanted to fight, but she did want to help. “No, I didn’t,” Sansa agreed. “But I had to do it. We all did, whether we should be here or not.”

Arya fell silent and Sansa thought that might be the end of it. She and her sister had always been close, first from having to put up with three brothers and then getting that apartment together in Fulton Landing. Now, they worked together in the shadows, had become close enough that most of the time they didn’t even need words. It made it easy for Sansa to see the cracks in her sister, being so close. The war had touched all of them in different ways, but it had hardened Arya’s smiles and made her vicious in a way that hurt Sansa to see.

“You know you can come back from this, don’t you?” Sansa asked.

“No,” Arya said, voice barely audible. “But you can.”

“But-“ Sansa tried to argue, but Arya had already turned her back.

“G’night, Sans.”

 Sansa knew her sister well enough that she could recognize that Arya wasn’t going to say anything else. There were words stashed inside Sansa, ones she wanted to say to each of her siblings. She wanted to tell Robb that he couldn’t win every fight, wanted to tell Bran that he couldn’t save everyone. She wanted to tell Rickon that his rage wasn’t going to help anything. She wanted to tell Arya that anyone could be broken.

But Sansa didn’t think she could say those words to them, not yet, no matter how much she wanted to. Because the truth was, they were all of them drowning.

**

Arya kicked her loose and Sansa felt herself fall. Arya hung on to the plane and she had said there was a _bomb_ on it. Sansa had heard the ticking, even over the roar of the wind.

“Arya!” the name ripped itself from Sansa’s gut and the plane flew higher and she fell lower.

The wind pushed up against her, hair blowing up like the tendrils of a flame and a part of her wanted to laugh; Sergeant Sansa Stark, the Little Bird, trying to fly. But Arya wasn’t falling after her. Arya had hung on and there was a _bomb_ and Arya had said-

The plane exploded above her and time slowed. Sansa fell and fell, too far below the wreck to see her sister. Too far below to see anything but the familiar orange swells of an explosion. She kept falling and Arya had said-

“You’re the one who can come back, Sansa.” And kicked her loose from the plane.

The water hit her hard, hit her cold.

**

She woke up to the sound of a baseball game.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello dear readers! Here's to you!
> 
> The below is my headcanon for Sansa in the story. I'm not sure what the model's name is and I apologize that's she's in lingerie. But otherwise I think she's just perfect. 
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Wanna say hi? Here's my tumblr: drolshakes.tumblr.com


	2. When This Bloody War is Over

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sergeant Sansa Stark and the Frightful Fight with the Fearsome Future!

Sansa’s mind shut down. The man had said that they were all dead, every one of them, and that it was the future and that her family was dead. Her breath hitched, knees began to tremble. Her bottom lip quivered and the man was still talking to her. She couldn’t hear him though, not through the shrill ringing in her ears but it wasn’t a ringing, no, it was a _creaking_ like ice freezing and breaking apart and Sansa’s breath hitched and hitched and hitched and-

“-best you come with us, Sergeant. SHIELD will help you get settled in, help you adjust-“

-and hitched and hitched and there was a _creaking_ in her ears and any moment now Arya would be shaking her shoulder to take over the watch but that wasn’t right because this wasn’t like any nightmare that she had ever had- and hitched and hitched-

“-You need to take a breath, Sergeant. I understand that this is a lot to take it, but you have to-“

-and hitched and hitched and hitched and and and _creak_ like the bolt-action of Bran’s Springfield M1903 going off again and again and her breath hitched because any minute now Arya would be shaking her awake and telling her that all of the prisoners were dead and that Sansa had been lost behind enemy lines, out in the cold, for ten days not for 70 years because how could it have been 70 years without Arya waking her up for her turn at watch but that was because this man had said that had said had said that-

“Sergeant, you need to calm down-“

-and hitched and hitched and hitched and tears were welling up in Sansa’s eyes and they were about to fall, they kept threatening to fall but they wouldn’t because they felt _frozen_ inside of her and they were _creaking_ inside of her like the bolt-action of Bran’s rifle but this man had said that they were all dead.

Sansa brought her eyes back to the man with the eyepatch, made herself breath. She drew in air and for a terrifying moment she thought that it would freeze inside of her lungs, and then she let it out. The tears were still clinging to the precipice of her eyelids and they wouldn’t fall and Sansa couldn’t force them to. The man’s eye was trained on her, squinted up and the lines of his mouth were hard and downturned. More agents had surrounded her and even though their weapons weren’t raised, Sansa could tell that they would be ready to in a moment’s notice. The man just had to signal and they’d shoot her.

 Sansa almost didn’t care. It was tempting to make herself a threat, to make them raise their weapons, to make them kill her. At least then she wouldn’t be out of time because _she should have died anyway_ but then she looked closer at the man. She took in exactly the way he was looking at her and the air around her _creaked_ again when she recognized the glint in his eye. It wasn’t concern, far from it. It was appraisal. The man in front of her was searching Sansa for weakness. To him, she wasn’t a soldier coming in from the war, she was still a weapon. He wasn’t going to let her die.

“Who are you?” she asked, forcing her voice to stay even.

“My name is Commander Mance Rayder. I’m the director of an organization named SHIELD; Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistic Division,” his mouth quirked up in something that looked like it was meant to be amusement. “A bit of a mouthful, I know. Your brothers wanted to make sure it spelled shield.”

Sansa forced her breath not to hitch again, forcing the words out: “My brothers…”

“Bran and Rickon helped found SHIELD in 1965 after the SSR disbanded,” Rayder said, that sickeningly kind tone back in his voice.

“And, and Robb?”

He didn’t say anything, his eye not leaving hers. The tears came back up but not over and this time Sansa couldn’t stop the break in her breath. “Sergeant, I really think that it would be best if you came back with us. SHIELD can help you get back in the world.”

“I-,” Sansa began, and then stopped because she had no idea what to say. She didn’t want to go with SHIELD because she didn’t want to be an asset, she wanted to be more than that. She wanted to go _back_ , even if that meant going back to sleeping in forests while it snowed, or back to clearing White Walker bases, she’d even go back to foxholes and trenches if it meant that Arya would be waking her up for her turn on watch.

But Sansa was a realist and she knew that either she could go with this man and SHIELD or she could break through the ring of agents, run through the New York crowd from Times Square to the Five Points and from the Five Points to the docks and from the docks she could get on a ship and go wherever that took her and then from there get to some lost, lonely corner of the world, maybe somewhere in Ireland, in the homeland, and forget everything about this brand new, empty world without her family.

“Okay,” Sansa pushed the word out of her throat. Rayder almost looked surprised but he nodded and beckoned her toward the large black car behind him. She made herself walk toward it, the agents in black falling into formation behind her. They were guarding her as if she was going to run away. As if they hadn’t yet realized that she had nowhere to go.

Sansa paused with her hand on the door handle, giving herself one more moment to believe that maybe, oh please dear lord maybe, Arya was going to shake her awake. She pulled the door open and slid into the car, two agents following her, and then Director Rayder sat down across from her, and Sansa let out the breath she hadn’t known that she’d been holding. The car door slammed shut.

Sansa couldn’t make herself look at Director Rayder and his accessing eye and chose to look out the window instead. New York had barely changed. Maybe the buildings were taller, made of glass, and it had somehow gotten even more crowded and there were more cars than there possibly could have been. And maybe it was louder, and more garish, and maybe it was faster, but it was still undoubtedly New York, the same frenetic chaotic energy thrumming through the streets. Sansa’s hand curled into a fist.

The car slipped down the crowded streets, back the way that Sansa had run from, bringing her into Lenox Hill and out of the theater district. Even now, Sansa knew this city like the back of her hand, Brooklyn-born-and-bred as she was, knew that she could still break out of this car and lose herself in her city. It was a small comfort, the assurance of escape.

She wanted to lean her head against the car window and close her eyes but she couldn’t afford it, not when she was so close to breaking. She didn’t trust Rayder and she didn’t trust SHIELD and she didn’t want them to see her break down. Instead of letting herself give in to the panic racing through her, Sansa forced herself to watch her city slip by.

“We’ll set you up with a room at SHIELD HQ for now. We’d like to run some tests, assign you a therapist to help you adjust,” Rayder said, drawing her attention.

Sansa nodded, remembering the SSR testing that had been just short of torture. That she could do, but therapy- “I won’t do electroshock,” she said, voice hard to hide the fear under it. There had been a boy in their neighborhood, Patchface, they’d called him Patchface.

“No worries, Sarge. We don’t do that anymore,” the director seemed to be trying to reassure her and Sansa let him believe that it was working. “You’ll be meeting with a therapist and talking. Just talking. Then, once you’ve been cleared, you’ll be set up in an apartment; SHIELD paid for and furnished.”

“Can it be in Brooklyn?” Sansa asked, because if she had to be in this empty future than at least she could be home.

“We’ll see what’s available,” Rayder said and Sansa recognized it as a dismissal. He would put her wherever she would be most convenient for him and his organization. She hadn’t expected anything more.

The car drove past the building she had run out of, pulling around the corner and stopping in front of a different entrance. She was led through two giant glass doors and into a marble lobby. In the center was a statue made of brass; all of the Howling Commandos with their guns at the ready, Captain America at the center with his shield raised high above his head. The sculptor given each of them stern steely eyes and grim expressions and they looked everything like the Captain, the Crow, the Wilding, the Direwolf and the Little Bird and nothing at all like the people that she had loved her entire life.

Sansa cut her eyes away from the statue and squared her jaw. Walking through the lobby felt like a processional. The other agents in the building, all dressed in some kind of navy uniform, were watching her and trying their hardest to act like they weren’t. She was on display and as much as she wanted to curl in on herself and finally break apart, Sansa kept her shoulders stiff and her chin out.

The room that Rayder led her to was a chilling white, gaping and empty. There was a bed in the corner, a desk in the other with a lamp and chair, a closet and a bathroom off to the side. It looked sterile. Sansa hid her grimace and stepped inside. As far as cells went, she had had worse.

The director followed her through, motioning the other agents away. “Agent Baratheon will be here soon. She’ll give you some new clothes and other necessities and answer any questions you may have,” he paused for a moment as if waiting for her to say something and Sansa turned to look at him.

She slipped a mask on her face: “Understood, sir.”

For a moment, he looked almost frustrated, taking a step towards her. “I understand that this is hard for you, Sergeant, but SHIELD is going to do everything it can to help you feel safe.” Sansa wanted to laugh. She couldn’t imagine feeling safe any time soon.

“Sir.”

Rayder looked at her a moment longer before sighing, realizing that he wasn’t going to get anything more out of her. He turned to leave and Sansa made herself call out to him, dredged up the question: “What’s the date, sir?”

“May 5, 2012.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Sergeant,” Rayder said with a nod and walked out of the room.

She closed the door behind him and leaned her head against it, finally allowing her eyes to fall shut and then her breath hitched and hitched and even though her tears wouldn’t fall _even though they were right there at the edge of her eyes_ and Sansa was 92 years old.

 It didn’t feel real, none of it. She’d been forcing herself to stay together until this moment and now she couldn’t fall apart. She wanted to, she felt like she _should_. That she should be collapsed on the floor with tears bleeding out of her and howling but she couldn’t. Sansa was so _tired_ , the weight crushing down on her because she was 92 years and how could this even be possible? Arya had said that she was supposed to be able to come back but Sansa had never expected to.

She’d gone into that war and then after the trenches she’d never really thought that she would live. There had been hope, dreams, thoughts of getting to watch fireworks on her birthday again and dance at the Aladdin and go back to the small, horrible apartment with Arya but she’d known, oh she’d known, that it would never be possible. Even if she had lived Sansa knew that she’d never get to go home.

A bitter laugh bubbled its way out of her throat because she had been right. Back in New York and 67 years later and alone and how could her family be _dead_? They’d been alive last night, had been alive _twenty minutes ago_ and she was supposed to go dancing with Willas if the mission had gone well and she hadn’t even thought of Willas until right now and the mission hadn’t gone well so she wouldn’t get to dance with him.

Sansa had missed 67 years and lost everyone she had ever loved and she was so _tired_ of losing people. So damn tired of it and she still couldn’t cry, even as the pain started wedging itself in the pit of her stomach. For a moment she thought she was going to be sick and Sansa laughed again. Was there anything in her stomach to even throw up? She hadn’t eaten for 67 years and the last thing she’d eaten had been army rations and those were always horrible coming up but 67 years was a long time for food to last.

For Sansa to last. She’d outlived them all and there was no one coming to rescue her from this. She remembered thinking that they had all of them been in it up to the neck and now she really was. All the way up to her neck.

It’d been 67 years and Sansa had never imagined that she could be left out in the cold for so long.

**

Sansa stayed leaning against that door until someone knocked on it. The knock was quick and efficient; sharp. Sansa pushed herself off the door and opened it, revealing a woman on the other side. She was tall and lithe with ink black hair tied in a secure bun. Her face was scarred and pock-marked on one side, reminding Sansa of the people in her neighborhood who had caught smallpox. Sansa had seen similar scars in the ward where her mother had worked as a nurse.

For a moment, the two women sized each other up. Sansa noted the tight coil the woman held herself in, ready to burst into action. Sansa was the same. The agent’s eyes were a deep brown and while they were not hard like Director Rayder’s had been, they were piercing and knowing.

Whatever the woman saw in Sansa must have satisfied her because she smiled suddenly and thrust a duffle bag at Sansa: “My name is Agent Baratheon. I’m supposed to help you settle in.”

Sansa slipped a smile on her face, more a mask than anything genuine. She backed into the room and deposited the bundle on the desk chair before turning back around to face Agent Baratheon. Sticking out her hand, she said, “Sergeant Sansa Stark. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

The woman took it, smiling back. For a moment, she looked almost…sad and then she schooled her features again: “Likewise.” After a moment, Agent Baratheon gestured towards the package she’d brought. “They’re clothes. Shoes too, and some toiletries. SHIELD will get you more tomorrow.”

“Thank you,” Sansa murmured, turning back to the desk. She found a zipper on the side of the duffle bag and opened it. Inside was a uniform like the one the agent was wearing as well as a pair of black boots and socks. It was a dark navy and seemed like some sort of a nylon blend. It was sturdy and well-made with an eagle logo on the side. Beneath that were a pair of soft trousers with a drawstring, something that looked like a camisole, and beneath all that were the undergarments.

“You can change in the restroom,” Agent Baratheon said, gesturing towards the door off to the side.

“Thank you,” Sansa said, closing the door behind her. She stripped methodically and as strange as the styles were, Sansa had to admit they were much more comfortable. She was surprised to find that the uniform was a single piece, not unlike the flight suits the RAF used. There was a zipper up the front and as she pulled it up, the jumpsuit fit itself to her body.

There was a mirror in the washroom and she’d been trying to avoid it. She caught glimpses of herself; flashes of her red hair, an expanse of pale skin. Smoothing down the fabric of the uniform, Sansa forced herself to finally look at her reflection. She hadn’t known what to expect but she’d expected at least _something_ to have changed. Nothing had. Not a single thing.

And Sansa broke. Gasping, she wrapped her hands around the porcelain rim of the sink. Her breathes came short and her eyes welled up with tears but they wouldn’t fall. She wanted the tears to fall so bad because wasn’t she supposed to cry? Her fingers griped harder and distantly she was aware that she’d broken the sink, plaster crumbling in her fist. With a howl that ripped itself out of her throat, Sansa thrust her fist against the mirror, shattering it.

The washroom door flew open and Agent Baratheon barged in, her body alert. Adrenalin pumping, Sansa fisted a large shard from the mirror and rounded on the agent, not registering that the other woman wasn’t a threat. Her chest heaved and her vision was blurred from her tears that wouldn’t fall and she held the shard in front of her like a last line of defense.

“Sergeant Stark, I need you to take a deep breath.” Agent Baratheon’s voice was calm but her eyes were panicked. “Please, Sergeant, put down the weapon and breathe.” The words didn’t mean anything to Sansa because she was alone and nothing made sense and-

“Stand down, soldier!” The agent’s voice was sharp and it cracked across Sansa’s mind like a whip.

The words clawed Sansa out of the mud in her mind because she could hear Robb yelling it again and again and again, and endless mantra in her head to _stand down soldier stand down_. Her breathes still ragged, Sansa squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to drop her make-shift knife. It fell with a clatter and Sansa fell with it. She was vaguely aware of tiny bits of glass beneath her knees. Absently, she ran her hand through her hair, not even noticing the blood and dust it left in its wake. She wanted to laugh at it all but stamped the urge down. It would have come out a scream anyway.

When she finally wrenched her eyes up from the floor, Sansa took in the state of the bathroom and the controlled look on Agent Baratheon’s face. She’d managed to rip a large chunk of plaster off of the sink, the sides sporting matching craters from her hands. The mirror was completely shattered, a hole behind it were Sansa’s fist had broken through the wall. Sansa let herself fall back against the wall, her legs spilling out in front of her. With distant amusement, she noticed that her feet were still bare.

Hesitantly, Agent Baratheon crouched in front of Sansa. She gestured wordlessly for Sansa’s hand and Sansa gave it. The cut wasn’t deep and it would heal within the next few hours. Still silent, Agent Baratheon moved to wet a towel in the broken sink. Coming back, she gently pressed against the slice in Sansa’s palm.

“Sorry,” Sansa mumbled, looking away. “I’m usually not so-“ violent, but that was a lie, “uncontrolled.”

Agent Baratheon just nodded, continuing to dab at the wound. Sansa could already feel her skin start to stitch itself back together. After she was done, Agent Baratheon moved to sit beside Sansa, her shoulder brushing against the glass shower stall. They sat there for a moment, each staring ahead. Sansa tried to let herself relax but her mind kept getting stuck like a record on the thought of 67 years going by.

“Do you spar?” Agent Baratheon asked, finally breaking the silence.

Sansa picked up her head from where she’d placed it on her knees and nodded at the woman beside her.

“Want to go a couple rounds?”

“Please,” Sansa whispered.

**

Sansa slammed the agent onto the map, the woman barely managing to dodge her next punch. In a moment, Baratheon was back on her feet, landing a kick against Sansa’s ribs. The fight calmed her in a way that would have sickened her years and years ago before the war. But she’d learned to take comfort where she could find it.

Panting, Baratheon ducked low and managed to block the uppercut that Sansa threw: “I thought they only taught you boxing in basic.”

“I didn’t go to basic,” Sansa respond and managed to get the agent into a headlock. It didn’t last long and Sansa found herself on her back, rolling away from the attack.

Sansa was good. She knew that. Agent Baratheon was better. She moved like water, every movement fluid and rolling into the next one without break. It looked like dancing and Sansa loved it. “If you’ve got time,” Sansa took another kick to the gut, “it’d be great to learn how to fight like you.”

For some reason, that brought the sad look back on the agent’s face. “I’d be glad to teach you,” she responded and Sansa kicked her feet out from under her.

**

The mess hall was almost obscene. Sansa had never been to a buffet in her life, had never had the money, and here there were rows of food, some of it for stuff she’d never even heard of. “It’s like the Depression never even happened,” Sansa muttered as she slid her tray down the metal counter. Beside her, Baratheon laughed.

Sansa loaded her tray with anything that looked good, still marveling at just how much there was and how for once she’d be able to satisfy her supersoldier metabolism. She glanced at another agent and had to stop herself from calling her out when she threw out a plate that was still mostly full. “It’s like they’ve never had a sugar ration,” she said.

“They haven’t,” Baratheon answered her with a shrug. “The government hasn’t rationed anything in a long time. People can get whatever food they want.”

“Least ways if they can get the money for it,” Sansa said, spooning soup into a bowl. The Starks had only ever dreamed of meals like this. When Baratheon stayed silent, Sansa glanced at her. “I’m assumin’ there’s still people that have’ta make payday stretch.”

“Unfortunately.”

Sansa huffed. “They fix the sugar ration but not the economy. Figures. I take it the New Deal didn’t work out quite as well as people were hopin’ it would.”

“There’s still the pension program and labor regulation,” Baratheon said, her mouth quirked in a half smile.

Sansa followed the agent over to one of the tables at the edge of the room and removed from most of the other agents in the room. Sansa had been actively ignoring the looks that they were giving her, like she was some kind of exhibit. She sat with her back to most of them even though it meant giving them a tactical advantage. She didn’t like the feeling of the eyes.

“That’s good,” Sansa said, cutting into the steak she’d gotten (and wasn’t it a sight to see a slab of steak in a mess hall). “Does SHIELD have a library? I’d like to catch up.”

That made Baratheon laugh again, ducking her chin while she did it. The agent didn’t seem used to laughing. “I’ll introduce you to the internet after dinner,” she said, the smile still on her lips.

Talking to Baratheon was easy. The woman was simple and straight forward, a sharp contrast to Director Rayder. Mostly it was just small talk, something to fill the silence. It’d been a long time since Sansa had done small talk. She’d forgotten what it was like to just mindlessly talk. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was taking a lot of effort for Sansa not to squirm. The longer she sat there the more aware she became of the people staring at her. It’d be more tolerable if the other agents weren’t trying so hard to make it seem like they weren’t actually looking.

Sansa had thought that she was hiding her discomfort well but suddenly Baratheon stopped talking about new music and asked, “What’s wrong?” The wariness was back in her voice, along with the tightness in her muscles.

Briefly, Sansa considered not telling her. Taking in the apparent earnestness in the agent’s eyes, Sansa deflated, letting her shoulder slump. “People keep staring at me.”

Baratheon nodded, “Of course they are. It’s not every day that you see a legend walking around.”

Sansa raised an eyebrow, not really sure how to respond to that.

“All the Starks are legends. Probably the biggest in America’s history. We might have lost the war without out you- you do know we won the war, right?” She asked all of a sudden, looking unsure.

“I figured that one out when I didn’t see any swastikas or White Walker fists decoratin’ the walls,” Sansa drawled.

“Right, well,” Baratheon soldiered on, “Captain America and the Howling Commandos are basically the reason that we won. That plane that you and Arya stopped? It was a drone plane and if the White Walkers had found it…it had the power to kill millions at a time.”

 _You’re the one who can come back come back come back_ Sansa almost laughed out of bitterness at the irony of the whole thing. Because Arya had been the hero, the one who jumped from the motorcycle to the plane to stop it. The one who sacrificed her life. Sansa had just followed.

“You’re heroes, all of you. And your brothers went on to do amazing things. You should be so proud. The world is never going to forget them.” Agent Baratheon looked so earnest it was almost painful to look at her.

“I’ve always been proud of ‘em,” Sansa said, trying to keep the heaviness out of her voice. “From Brooklyn to Europe, I was proud of ‘em. Best people I know-knew.”

Behind her, someone cleared their throat and Sansa turned and saw an agent standing behind her, reeking of nervousness. He looked young, barely 20 years old. It saddened Sansa to think that SHIELD started them that young. Not that her family had been any different though.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I wanted to tell you that it’s an honor to have you here at SHIELD,” the agent said and it sounded rehearsed for all that it was sincere.

Dredging up a smile, Sansa stood and stuck her hand out to the man who shook it like it was the most amazing thing he’d ever done. “Thank you, Agent…”

“Payne,” the man said quickly and then flushed. “My name is Agent Podrick Payne.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Agent Payne,” Sansa said, keeping that practiced smile on.

The agent flushed, “Oh, god, no. The pleasure is mine. Captain America is the reason I joined SHIELD and, just, meeting a Howling Commando- well, another one. I met Wildling-Agent Stark- once and he was incredible. And so are you-“

“Payne,” Baratheon spoke up, cutting him off. The words weren’t biting but he instantly fell silent; she was clearly the superior officer.

“I just wanted to say that it’s an honor,” Payne said, much more subdued. “I’ll leave you to your meal.”

“I look forward to meeting you again, Agent,” Sansa said, the manners second nature to her. He blushed again before making a hasty retreat, looking like Christmas had come early.

“Sorry about him,” Baratheon said after Sansa sat back down. “He’s just a big fan. Like I said, you’re a legend.”

Sansa nodded, feeling a little dirty. None of them had done it to become legends. They’d just wanted to help and then they got turned into a circus spectacle. Agent Payne had seemed nice enough, and his excitement was a little endearing, but the whole thing had left a sour taste in her mouth.

“Can I call you Sansa?” Baratheon asked.

Sansa looked up at her; “Why?”

“Most people are going to call you Sergeant. Or Stark or…or who knows. I thought you might want someone to call you by your name. You call me Shireen, I’ll call you Sansa.”

Sansa’s smile was sad and small; “I’d like that.”

**

Shireen left her with a laptop and a list.

               _Manhattan Project_

_Cold War_

_McCarthyism_

_Martin Luther King Jr./Civil Rights Movement_

_Vietnam War_

_John F. Kennedy_

_Watergate_

_9/11_

She’d said it was a good place to start.

**

It is white and blinding and it is cold and you can’t move.

Around you, you can hear the ice creaking and in the whiteness, it is deafening.

You think you’re standing but it’s hard to tell in all the whiteness.

You try to turn your head and you can’t and you try to lift your arm and you can’t and you try to run and you can’t and you try to turn around and you can’t and you try to scream and your mouth won’t open and the ice creaks louder.

The white fades into your bedroom in Brooklyn.

You can hear Arya in the kitchen cursing at the broken radiator.

Relief surges through you and you try to run to your sister. You can’t because _you still can’t move_ and snow is falling softly in the room and it is so gentle, leaving a thin coat on your bed and dresser. It keeps falling though and falling and you can see past the door, can see your dingy couch and Arya’s boxing gloves and you want to move so badly but you can’t even get the sob out of your throat.

The ice is still _creaking_.

Bran stands behind you, showing you how to hold the rifle.

The snow is a blizzard and how are you supposed to hit the mark on the tree if you can’t _see_ it and can’t _move_ to pull the trigger but now Bran is gone and your finger is moving, pulling back on the trigger and the shot rings out and Robb screams and falls and his blood is so _blinding_ against the snow and you want to sob but it still won’t come out-

 You can hear the ice creaking and creaking and creaking and you can’t move because it is swallowing you whole and Arya is staring at you and she is missing an arm and half her face and she _won’t stop staring_ and you _still can’t cry_ and the _ice is still creaking_ and the bedroom is full of snow and the walls are covered in ice and your finger is moving and you shoot your brother and your sister is bleeding out of a hole in her stomach and it keeps happening again and again and you keep shooting your brother and trying to scream and nothing moves but your trigger finger because Bran was wrong and wrong and wrong because you _can_ kill everyone and you shoot Robb again and Arya keeps staring at you and the whole time the ice is _creaking_ and all you want to do is _move_ -

**

Sansa forced her eyes open and it was so much more difficult than it should have been. Her eyelids dredged up slowly, as if they had been crusted over for decades. Her lungs felt like stiff bellows, ones that didn’t want to expand, didn’t want to contract, a scream stuck down deep in them. With her eyes finally open, Sansa began to realize that her body was curled in a fetal position, her legs pulled to her chest, her chin tucked down against her knees, and her hands fisted in her hair and pulling tight. And she couldn’t move, could barely breathe.

Sansa could feel a chill settling itself into her bones, one that was nothing like the cold of being behind enemy lines in winter but also absolutely the same. Every time she closed her eyes, Sansa remembered the blizzard in her dream and her eyes flew open again because all of that cold terrified her.

She concentrated on willing her body to move, anything to get the ice out of her. She just wanted to twitch, to shudder, anything so long as she moved. With a whimper on her lips, Sansa forced herself to move her finger and if she could have wept from relief, she would have. She moved the finger again, uncurling it from her hair. She did it again and again until it was two fingers, three, four, and then her hand splayed flat on her head. Sansa kept willing herself to move and force the ice out of her. From her hands, then to her feet, her arms, her legs, until she wretched her body out of the bed, tumbling onto the floor, a gasp of relief punching out of her.

But the sob still wouldn’t dislodge itself from her chest. She could feel the tears just on the edge of welling in her eyes, her breath just a hitch away from the hysterics. But nothing came.

She knew that sleep was going to be impossible tonight. The horror of the nightmare was still clinging to her, the terror of the ice. Remembering the gym that Shireen had taken her to, small and out of the way, Sansa walked out the door of the white room. She didn’t bother to change from the soft pants and camisole that she’d been sleeping in.

It was easy to remember where the gym was and she found the doors open. She’d expected to be stopped on her way here, or for the doors to be locked. It made Sansa feel uncomfortable instead of free because it meant that Sansa was being watched and she didn’t know where the cameras were.

The gym was mostly dark except for a spot in the back corner. She could hear a man grunting, the familiar sound of fists hitting a punching back. Sansa considered leaving but the thought of going back to that cold, white room was worse than sharing the early morning hours with a stranger.

Sansa made her way over to the same back corner, stopping to drag a punching bag out of a supply closet Shireen had shown her earlier. She also grabbed some of the athletic tape. She may be a supersoldier but old habits die hard and her brother had taught her better than that. The other man hadn’t stopped his routine when she’d walked in and he didn’t even pause when she hooked up her own bag next to his. Nonetheless, she had the distinct impression that he was watching her. She’d felt his eyes on her; it was calculating and swift. An appraisal of her as a threat. Sansa looked back and made no effort to hide what she was doing.

The man was gigantic, bigger even than Rickon had been. His shoulders were broad and his waist was tapered down, turning into slim hips with strong thighs. The shirt he wore was tight and gripped at his muscles like paint. Sweat was dripping down his brow and darkened his armpits, dampening his brow and the loose bun his hair was in. He hit the punching bag with a fierce intensity, his eyes harder than the punches he was throwing. His movements were sharp, pointed, powerful, the lines of his body fluid.

His face made her pause for a moment, the right half of it mangled with scars. They made his brow droop over his eye and he’d lost most of his right ear. Sansa took in the hook of his nose, the jaggedness of his cheekbones and the firm jawline. She got caught in the hard glint of his eyes though, the ones that refused to look back at her. This man had been shaped by a world that was as cruel as it was ugly.

She deliberately looked away from him, eyes dropping down to tape up her hands before turning to her punching bag. It was swaying slightly from when she’d hung it and she put her hands out to steady it. It’d been a long time since she’d just hit a bag like this. It’d been since before the Howling Commandos, since before they’d left for Europe, since before her parents had been killed. Sansa swung her first undercut.

She fell into the rhythm easily. It wasn’t exactly familiar- she hadn’t done this has often as the rest of her siblings- but it was calming in a way that sparring wasn’t. Sansa could just let her body do the work, let it mull her over into exhaustion. Even though her pa had given her her first lessons, Robb had taught her how to find the rhythm in it.

She remembered how Robb had held the bag steady, gently correcting her until her fists hit steady and strong. Robb had always been so busy working at the docks and it had made Sansa savor the training all the more. He didn’t laugh often and didn’t smile nearly as much he had as a child, but that old gym in Red Hook had made him look lighter than he had in years.

Even then Robb had always been fighting, just back then it was for unions by helping to publish the Daily Worker, fighting along with all the members of the Radical Women’s League, an endless fight day after day after day and being Captain America hadn’t made it any better. Not when he was already so tired of carrying the weight of the world. He was exhausted most days even though he stood proud and faced it with his chin jutted out. It made him bone-weary but Robb had always believed he was going to win. He’d fought the fight but it had made him smile a whole lot less.

Sansa hit the bag harder, faster. She felt like she should miss Robb, miss all of them but she couldn’t. It still didn’t feel real because somehow she had died seventy years ago and they had all died but they had been in a pub last night singing about how they had to ac-cent-tchu-ate the positive because there was a war on and tomorrow you might die and they did. Her knuckles pounded into the bag.

Sansa hit the bag and hit the bag and hit the bag and the bag ripped off of its hook and burst as it slammed against the back wall, sand spilling out of it. Sansa’s breath was coming fast again, sweat dripping off of her. Running a hand down her face, Sansa stalked back to the supply closet, picking up another bag. She hefted it above her, putting it on its hook. Sansa started again, this time hitting it with vicious jabs and roundhouse kicks. She knew her form was off and that she was using too much force and Robb would have corrected her but Robb was dead and she _shouldn’t be here_.

Sansa gritted her teeth. She knew that she should get a grip on herself. She was too strong to let herself lose control. The Stark siblings had learned the hard way what too much strength could do; a lesson learned in shattered mugs, broken jars and holes in the walls. She’d learned that lesson with Willas’ body and the way she’d kissed him too hard and in the bruises the shape of her fingers.

But her body kept moving like it would never stop and it was so much better than the ice so she caved into it. The canvas beneath her knuckles split and Sansa growled, changing her aim to compensate around the trickle of sand. When she broke through that part too she changed to her right jab. When that spot broke, Sansa bit down her shout and threw a haymaker. The bag ripped almost in half, spilling sand down on Sansa and making a mess on the floor.

The man laughed, the sound sudden and harsh in the dark gym. He was leaning against his own bag, slowly un-taping his hands. It wasn’t a happy sound; filled with mirth and something close to bitterness. Sansa cut him a glare and he didn’t flinch under it. Instead he pushed away from his bag and beckoned her over: “I’m done with this.” His voice was gravel with a Russian accent.

“Thanks,” she muttered, brushing some of the sand off before walking over. He stepped out of her way and she squared herself in front of the new bag. His eyes were still on her when she went back to using her hook.

“You have a good swing. Lot of force,” the man said.

She looked at him and threw another haymaker, this time more controlled and more aware of her strength: “Thanks.”

“You know how to say anything besides thanks?” Sansa lifted her brow at him. “Makes sense. The Little Bird and her manners.”

Sansa halted, turning on him: “You know who I am?”

He laughed again: “Everyone knows who you are, Little Bird. America’s darling,” he said, the bitterness back in his voice.

Sansa scowled: “America’s _what_?”

The man just shook his head and walked away. “Hey! Hey, I’m talkin’ to you!” She shouted after him but he was already going through the door, leaving her alone.

“Asshole,” she muttered, going back to the punching bag.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Issue! Therapy! Training! Boxing with an angry Russian ex-KGB Assassin! Director Rayder makes an offer! Can Sansa refuse?
> 
>  
> 
> Also, this is the standard SHIELD uniform, so just imagine Sansa & Co. wearing this (and yeah, that includes Sandor), white boots and all.
> 
>  


	3. While Those Caissons Go Rolling Along

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess now is the time to tell you that I'm playing with house lineages a bit in this story. I know that Willas and Margaery are siblings and later a certain someone is going to be around that's out of lineage too. But hey, what's a little crack among friends?

Dr. Lewin was looking at her kindly, his lips smoothed in a smile that was meant to be understanding. It made Sansa uncomfortable. “I’m not sure how this is supposed to work,” she said to fill in the silence.

“Ah,” the doctor said, leaning forward in his plush armchair. “I suppose that this would be a rather new concept to you. We’re just going to talk.”

“That’s all?” Sansa asked.

“That’s all,” he said with the same soothing smile.

Sansa nodded, taking a moment to consider it. People hadn’t thought that therapy was a good thing, more like a dirty word; something that people whispered about. “What do we talk about?”

“It would be natural for you to be struggling with your new situation, your position,” Dr. Lewin began. “Our meetings are an opportunity to work through those struggles.”

“To help me adjust.”

“Or if there’s anything else you’d like to talk about.”

“Like what?”

Dr. Lewin looks at her for a moment, considering. “There’s a term, they used to call it shell shock but in the 1980s it got coined post-traumatic stress disorder. It applies to people who have gone through extremely traumatic events, like war, natural disasters, rape. People who have had experience like that cause- let’s call them after effects. It can make something linger in the person long after the events are over. Things like nightmares, losing time, paranoia. Many soldiers can experience this.”

Sansa nodded, remembering. “They come home wrong.”

“Maybe not wrong, but changed.” Dr. Lewin paused again, as if waiting for Sansa to offer something up. She didn’t. “Would you like to start there?”

“You want to know if the war changed me?”

“Did it?”

“Doc, that war changed _everything_.”

**

“You’re here early,” Sansa said. She’d stayed in the gym until the sun came up and was surprised to find the cafeteria open and even more surprised to find Shireen at one of the tables with a cup of coffee and a laptop. “Do you live here?”

Shireen shook her head, closing the laptop with a sharp clip: “I have an apartment in Inwood.”

“So an early start then?”

“I like getting up with the sun,” the agent said with a small smile.

 “How about the others,” Sansa gestured to the scattered agents eating around them before settling into her eggs. “Any of them live here?”

After taking a quick glance around, Shireen shook her head. “Not many people actually stay at HQ. Usually it’s a temporary situation.”

“What about him?” Sansa asked, pointing her fork at the man from last night. He was glowering down at a plate of waffles, this time dressed in the standard SHIELD uniform, his hair still tied up in a tight bun.

Shireen paused, looking at him. “Clegane’s not here too often. He’s usually out in the field. Must be a special mission.”

“What’s he usually do?” Sansa bit into her bacon, reveling in the taste. She hadn’t had bacon since, what, ’39? Least ways, not good bacon. That English stuff had been an offense.

“He does a lot,” Shireen took a long drag of her coffee. “What he does usually isn’t very nice, but he’s the best at it. He used to work for the KGB and before that…well, I don’t much about before all that.”

“What’s the KGB?”

“Oh, um, a Russian, well Soviet, police force? Sort of like the, what were the Nazi police called?” Shireen asked, her brow furrowed.

“The gestapo,” Sansa supplied.

“Yeah, the gestapo. Like them. Add it to you list.”

Sansa nodded and turned back to her bacon. She’d forgotten how good it could taste.

**

The first thing that the SHIELD scientists tested was her endurance. They made her run around a track until she couldn’t anymore. Sansa ran for an hour at her top speed. She ran for two more after that.

**

“Do you want to talk about the war?” Dr. Lewin persisted, refusing to be deterred by Sansa’s concise answers and polite smiles.

“I’m just like any other soldier,” Sansa answered. “I’m not sure I really have much to say.”

“You had a unique experience in the war. You and your sister weren’t permitted join at first, is that correct?”

“The army only wanted my brothers, thought that women shouldn’t be out in the field. So we went into the field without the army.” Sansa’s grin was feral. “They didn’t like that much.”

Dr. Lewin laughed gently, “No, I can’t imagine that they did.” He sobered. “But you fought on the front lines for months before you were discovered. That must have been quite the experience. Would”- _you_ _are going mad from the shelling. Your foxhole is snug and deep and worn down, molded to your body, molded to Arya’s. The shelling is going to drive you insane. Last night Tommy’s arm fell in your lap. He was a nice guy, a real stand up kinda fella and a mouth that ran at about a mile a minute. Tommy’d known all the good jokes and had blushed real hard when he realized he’d been telling ‘em to a couple ‘a ladies. And his arm had fallen perfectly in your lap, palm up like he was waiting to take your hand before a dance. You’d thrown it out of the hole without a second thought. Tommy wouldn’t need it anymore and there was only so much room down here. And a few minutes later, Arya had popped over the edge of your foxhole and reached down saying, “Hey, coulda give me a hand?” And you’d laughed and laughed, tears running down your face and you keeled over, clutching your sides. Arya had glanced over her shoulder, seen what was left of Tommy and then snorted, trying real hard not to laugh too, and then failing miserably. She’d tumbled into the foxhole, landing on top of you and you’re both howling with tears running down your cheeks_ “-rgeant Stark, can you come back to me?” Dr. Lewin’s voice called Sansa back to the room, back to the plush armchair she was sitting in.

“It was,” she said and her voice only shook for a moment. “There’s nothing else like it.”

**

They tested her agility next. The scientists kept making pleased little humming sounds whenever she dodged something or completed an obstacle course. She was a prize horse and when she saw Rayder come into the room, she realized that she was up for auction.

**

“You had a dissociative episode. These are common with people suffering from PTSD,” Dr. Lewin was saying. Sansa kept her face blank and tried to quell her panic because she couldn’t move. Her therapist hadn’t seemed to notice so that meant that Sansa was hiding it well. He was telling her that she’d lost time for about five minutes and Sansa wanted to nod to show that she understood but she couldn’t.

Sansa forced her foot to tap the floor.

**

Shireen adjusted Sansa’s stance, pushing her feet further apart. “You want to start in this position. It gives you the biggest range of motion. Now, if someone attacks you from behind-“

**

Sansa nodded at Dr. Lewin.

**

“Okay, maybe don’t hit _quite_ that hard,” Shireen said with a small smile, rubbing her stomach. “We can’t all be supersoldiers.”

“Sorry,” Sansa mumbled, getting back into the resting position.

“Hey, no problem.”

**

After completing a training course in a minute flat, Rayder nodded, satisfied. Sansa felt like she was going to be sick.

**

“I thought there were supposed to be crafts,” Sansa blurted, interrupting Dr. Lewin. “Knitting needles an’ all that. Something for people to do, be useful.”

She could tell that Dr. Lewin was frustrated with her. He wanted her to talk about the _dissociative episode_ and what Sansa thought about the war but she couldn’t bring herself to share something so personal with a stranger. Instead of forcing it though, Dr. Lewin smiled kindly and asked, “Would that make these meetings easier?”

**

Sansa woke up with a gasp and a shout at the edge of her throat. Her hand flew to her breast as if to press her heart back into her chest. Then she laughed in relief, a dry choking sound, because at least this time she could move. It’d been all black, all cold, the kind of cold that burns, and the kind of black that was empty and she’d felt the heaviness of the ice _pressing_.

But Sansa could move, so she got out of the bed and flipped on the desk light before starting to pace. It’d been a long day, achingly long, and all she wanted to do was go back to sleep but she couldn’t make herself do it. Glancing at the laptop, Sansa sat at the desk and turned it on. She typed “Manhattan Project” into the search bar, clicked the first link, and started to read.

Ten minutes later, Sansa ran to the bathroom and threw up her dinner. Fury was roiling through her, mixed up tight with something else.

Ten minutes after that, Sansa realized that it was shame.

**

She’d already gone through one punching bag and the second one wasn’t faring much better when the doors to the small gym banged open. A quick glance told her that it was Clegane. She hadn’t gotten around to researching the KGB yet but a glance at him told her that it wouldn’t be anything nice. Not even close. He walked like the current kept beating him back.

Her fists pounded against the punching bag even as she made a conscious effort to reign her strength in. Clegane hadn’t even glanced at her, had just started to stretch, his arms swinging back and forth in front of his body. It made the muscles in his back roil and Sansa glanced away.

“Clegane, right?” she asked, just to break the silence.

“Да,” he said, rolling his shoulders.

“You got a first name?”

“Do you care?”

Sansa huffed: “It would just be nice to know.”

“Because you want to get to know me, is that it?” Clegane answered, his voice full of hard edges. He glanced over at the wall, at the leaking punching bag; “How many are you going to break?”

“I’ll make sure to leave you a couple,” Sansa said and she couldn’t help it if her Brooklyn drawl came out with it.

To her surprise, Clegane snorted and his mouth quirked up just the slightest bit. He bent down to pick up the cotton hand wrap she had dropped. “Can you box, or do you just like to hit the bag?”

Sansa paused, letting her fists drop. “I can box,” she said, trying hard not to think about that gym in Red Hook.

“Do you want to get in the ring?” Clegane asked, jerking his head at the small boxing ring in the middle of the gym.

Sansa considered for a moment. The offer was unexpected and it’d be better than hitting a bag over and over again, breaking them. She met his eyes, and found them hard. He wasn’t offering out of pity.

“Alright,” Sansa agreed. “Are there gloves in the supply closet?”

“We don’t need them,” he said.

“I fight you without ‘em I might break you.”

His jaw clenched; “You will not break me.”

“Look pal, we fight with gloves or we’re not fightin’ at all,” Sansa said. When he didn’t say anything else she walked over to the supply closet, surprised when he followed.

Sansa let the silence keep between them. It was nice, in a way. She’d been surrounded by noise all her life; city living and terrible tenements with thin walls. And then of course there’d been the war. In this gym though, it was quiet and Clegane melted into it, a silent shade at her side.

He was a quiet fighter too. He didn’t try to goad her like Rickon had, didn’t laugh like Arya would, or give advice like Robb. Bran had been quiet, like her; more focused on the deliberation of the moves than winning the fight. But Clegane fought nothing like Bran. There was a ferocity in the way he moved. He came at her like a storm and his strength was greater than she expected; she could feel bruises forming. “You hit harder than you should,” she breathed in between punches.

“And you don’t hit as hard as I thought you would,” he responded. No, he _goaded_ ;calling her out for pulling her punches. She ducked his swing, drove a fist into his abdomen. “Better.”

She hit him again, letting herself use more of her strength, because- because he could take a hit like _Robb_. He landed a punch against her stomach and it drove the breath out of her, because- because he _shouldn’t be able to hit like that_. “The KGB, did they replicate my parents’ serum?” Sansa asked, breathing fast.

“Not the KGB,” Sandor said, trying to drive her into a corner. “But it is not the same as yours. It only makes me stronger.”

“Right,” Sansa muttered and danced out of his range.

She put herself back into the fight, letting herself loose, knowing that he could take it. Clegane seemed to be getting frustrated though, his swings more wild, his guard dropping just a little. It was enough though for Sansa to get in close and drives her fists against his stomach once, twice, three times. She brought her arm back, ready to strike again, when Clegane shoved her off. The strength behind the push almost made her fall. Sansa could feel the fury rolling off of him and backed off to the other side of the ring.

“Aren’t you going to ask about it?” he snarled.

“Do you want to tell me?” she asked, keeping her body coiled, alert.

“No,” he bit out.

“Then I won’t ask,” the answer didn’t seem to appease him though, and he ripped off one of his gloves, heaving it across the gym.

“And what about this?” he yelled, jabbing a finger at the scars on his face. “Don’t you want to ask about this?”

Sansa took him in, watched the rage in his eyes. When she didn’t answer, he tore off his other gloves, throwing it hard against the matt. During the fight, some of his hair had fallen loose from the bun he kept it in, hanging sweaty and damp across his face. It made him look wild. “I just want to box,” she said, keeping her voice even.

“Врёшь!! Stop lying! Everybody wants to know about my scars,” Clegane started stalking towards her and Sansa held her ground. She was almost positive that she could take him in a fight. His anger would make him careless.  

“Everybody has scars.”

“Do you have scars? Are you scarred on the inside, Little Bird? Hurt deep down where no one can see?” His throat made a dry, cracking sound and Sansa realized that it was a laugh. A bitter one. “ Everyone knows that supersoldiers do not scar. They heal too fast.”

He came to a stop in front of Sansa, looming, forcing her to look up as she said, “Hurt someone deep enough and anyone can scar.”

“Your brother didn’t have any,” his voice grated and Sansa saw his scarred lip twitch.

“Yeah? That’s the best news I’ve heard since wakin’ up.”

His hand shot out, snagging her arm and pulling her until she was flush against him. Clegane’s fingers curled around her forearm hard enough that they would leave bruises; a testament to whatever serum he’d been given. “Let go,” Sansa said, letting steel filter into the words. She watched his eyes flicker down at her bare arms and knew what he would see. Sansa watched his eyes widen, meet hers and then go back down. “Let go of me, Clegane.”

He did, releasing her suddenly and backing off. He looked almost sick.

“Yeah,” Sansa muttered. Bringing her wrist to her mouth, she ripped the tape off the bottom of the glove and unraveled it. After pulling it off, she switched hands. She tossed it to the corner with the other one and finally looked back at Clegane. He looked stricken and Sansa felt anger swell inside her. “Do you enjoy bullying people?” she accused.

“I’ve never been called a bully before,” he said, his voice almost blank.

“I thought “bastard” would be too rude.”

Clegane chuffed even as his eyes narrowed; “And you wouldn’t want to forget your manners.”

Sansa, suddenly exasperated by the man’s mood swings, rolled her eyes. “There’s nothin’ wrong with being polite.”

“It is just an easier way to lie.”

“Everyone here is a liar,” Sansa whirled on him, this time crowding him. “Every single one of ‘em. If manners are lies than at least they’re nice ones.” She paused, searching his eyes.

“How do you lie, Clegane? How do you do it?”

For a moment, Sansa thought that he was going to grab her again. Clegane looked like he was going to fight her on it until he suddenly deflated and dropped his head. Sansa let him take his moment and when he finally looked up, he seemed resigned. “Sandor,” he said. “My first name is Sandor.”

Sansa took the surrender, backed off. “Alright then. Sandor.” He nodded at her.

 After a moment, he dropped his eyes and scratched at the back of his neck and Sansa was charmed somehow, to see this large man feeling awkward. She hadn’t thought it possible. “Would you like to continue the fight?” he asked.

“Are you going to grab me again?” Sansa retorted.

“Only if you do not move fast enough,” Clegane said with a look that wasn’t quite a smirk.

It made Sansa smile and it was the closest she’d gotten to something genuine the whole day. “Alright sure, why not.” When he met her eyes again, he looked almost pleased. “But we’re gonna need to get more wrap for the gloves.”

“You and your gloves,” Sandor muttered, but his lips were upturned.

**

The next morning there were knitting needles and three different skeins of yarn: red, white and blue. Sansa hid her grimace. Dr. Lewin motioned her into the same armchair she’d sat in yesterday- the one that was too plump and too low. She sat it in anyway, avoiding the kindly smile of the doctor’s face.

“I thought it might make you more comfortable,” he said, nodding towards the yarn. Then a thought seemed to occur to him: “You do know how to knit, don’t you?”

Sansa nodded: “I thought everyone knew how to knit.”

“Changing times, I’m afraid,” Dr. Lewin said. Sansa picked up the knitting needles.

He watched her for a long moment, staying silent as she cast on. Sansa tried to think of something to say, something that would satisfy him. “My brother taught me how to knit,” she said for lack of anything better. “Robb,” she clarified.

“Not your mother?”

Sansa laughed, but it was a dry sound. “I’m not sure my mother knitted anything after she started working on the serum,” Sansa paused, because no, that was wrong. “She made Bran a blanket while she was pregnant with him.” Catelyn had started it at least. Robb had finished it. Sansa picked up another needle from the pile and started working it in.

“What are you planning on making?”

“Socks. It’s my specialty.”“Did you make them for your siblings?”

Sansa worked in another needle, creating a square. She took a breath. “Sometimes. I made ‘em for whoever needed ‘em. There wasn’t a whole lot of money to go around so I would trade socks for stuff we needed. Or sweaters. A scarf. Whatever people would take.”

“And your family, they did the same?” Dr. Lewin had that kindly smile again. Sansa shifted in her seat.

“We all did what we could to help the neighborhood,” she kept her eyes focused on the knitting even though she could have made the sock blind.

“It must have been a strong community,” Dr. Lewin continued, trying to eke more information from Sansa.

She wanted to give it, she did, wanted to tell him about how her family had lost their house in Bay Ridge during the Depression because her parents cared more about the serum than their jobs. She wanted to tell him about moving into a tenement building in Red Hook that had two bedrooms and how one of them was for her parents and the other one was for the lab and how she and her siblings took couch cushions and blankets and slept on the floor. She wanted to tell him that sometimes the community hadn’t been so nice to certain groups of people and that Arya had once beat a boy with a pipe for calling their dad a crazy mick and that there had been block fights every other week and the cops never came when they were needed but yes, it had been a strong community because Mrs. McCrery always offered to watch Rickon when Sansa had to pick up a shift or because sometimes O’Brien let the rent be a day late because he was sweet on her ma and it’d been a good thing when the Irish took over the neighborhood because everyone knew that the Irish were better than the Russians.

But Sansa didn’t know how to say any of that so she just nodded her head and kept her eyes on her knitting.

**

Shireen wasn’t there at breakfast but Clegane was sitting at a table alone and hunched over a cup of coffee. Lifting her chin, Sansa walked over and plopped her tray down across from him. His eyebrows quirked up but he didn’t say anything.

Sansa settled in at the table and dug into her plate with gusto. She’d never gotten out of the habit of eating quickly; not enough food and four siblings had that effect.

“That’s a lot of bacon,” Clegane said, his raspy voice sounding slightly awed.

Sansa glanced down at the almost obscene pile of it on her plate. “Yeah,” she agreed. “And you don’t get any.”

That surprised a laugh out of him and Sansa grinned back, taking a large bite of bacon.

**

SHIELD tested her pain tolerance that morning. They hooked wires to her head, explaining that they weren’t actually going to hurt her, just trick her brain into thinking that they were. They’d said it was necessary. Sansa didn’t need to ask why.

**

The scientists kept upping the pain levels on their _stupid terrible beeping_ machine as if they were just begging her to scream to let out every single sensation they were pouring into her until she was hoarse with it and she wanted to she wanted to she wanted to scream so _bad_ because these _bastards_ didn’t know they didn’t know how much pain she could take before she screamed they didn’t know that it’d been worse at the White Walker base that it’d been worse when she’d _felt_ the _ice crushing her lungs in and settling her into like a knife and how much it had burned_ they didn’t know that she remembered the way that they had thawed her body how it had _burned_ like the chemicals that the White Walkers had pumped through her and _burned_ like she’d been walking on the sun and _burned_ like the stench they’d found in the camps and _this was nothing_ their wires were nothing and nothing and nothing because Sansa knew that it didn’t even compare to what it had felt like to wake up in this _stupid terrible beeping_ world and Sansa _wanted_ to scream they didn’t know how bad she wanted to but it kept getting stuck in her throat but it had nothing to do with those wires-

**

“I would really like to talk about what happened yesterday, Sergeant. You disassociated for nearly five-“

“You know, my pa fought in the Great War,” Sansa cut him off because this was the best answer she had. “He started out on the front lines, in the trenches, until the government found out he was some kind of hotshot chemist and put him to work on making a supersoldier serum,” Sansa stopped, using her knitting as pretense to pause while she counted the stitches. “Did you know that the first times they tested it, it didn’t work? The serum, it burned men up from the inside. I guess the government didn’t like that very much and they stopped the project.”

“When your father came home from the war, did he seem-changed? Like how we talked about?” Dr. Lewin asked.

Sansa couldn’t bring herself to look at him. “Ma said once that he used to smile more an’ go out dancin’. But I didn’t know him that way; none of us did. He was- quiet and- serious, I suppose you’d say, and-“ Sansa’s throat clicked dry. Dr. Lewin waited for her patiently.

“He’d get a little lost sometimes,” Sansa forced the words out because now that look in her father’s eyes made so much more sense. “I think that’s why he worked so hard on the serum. It cleared things up for him, up there,” she said, waving her hand around her head, unsure of how else to put it. “The numbers, maybe. It made him have to focus. And then sometimes-“ Sansa stopped again because saying what came next felt like a betrayal. Her father’s pain wasn’t hers to share.

“Sometimes I think that we all would have been better off without the serum,” she finished instead because it was the closest to the truth.

**

There was shouting and a lot of it. Sansa blinked. The room slowly coming back into focus. When she tried lifting her head, a heavy hand fell on her shoulder to stop her. Vaguely, she was aware that the wires were being pulled off of her and that the pain had stopped.

“-vitals returning to within normal range-“

“I didn’t even realize that she had-“

“-those levels shouldn’t have been possible but-“

“-can’t imagine how much-“

“I thought she’d scream before she-“

“Why didn’t she _tell_ us that it-“

Sansa let her eyelids flutter shut, feeling exhausted all the way down to her bones.

           

**

Sansa couldn’t move her body. Time slipped by and her fingers were tangled in her hair, her knees dragged up against her chest and her breaths shallow. They came so quickly that black spots were beginning to form in the edges of her eyes. Sansa didn’t know how much time had passed since she was shaken out of her nightmare, from the creaking of the ice, and she couldn’t convince her body to just _move_.

Her body ached with phantom pain and the terror of the nightmare clung to her skin like a stench. She didn’t even have enough energy to let out the whimper clawing at her throat. The _test_ had thrown her so far back in her head that panic felt like it was only a step away, that if she gave into the ice for just a moment, the pain would come flooding back into her and worse than that she would still be frozen when it happened.

She thought of the little gym and how her fists felt against the punching bag. She thought of the motion of it all. It was the closest thing to comfort that she’d found so far and she wanted it so bad. The quiet of it, the peace of it, even Clegane’s steady presence grounding her.

She tried to uncurl her fingers. It didn’t work. Sansa’s breath came quicker because _oh god what if she could never move again_ and _what if the ice came back was back and crushing back down on her lungs_ and she tried so hard to uncurl her fingers because _damned if she’d let that happen again_.

Her finger twitched.

**

Dr. Lewin smiled kindly.

Sansa ate breakfast with Shireen. She glanced at Clegane.

The scientists put a gun in her hand and pointed her towards the targets. She hit every one of them. The scientists looked impressed. They looked scared. Sansa didn’t tell them that she was better with a knife.

Shireen introduced her to Brazilian Capoeira and Sansa might as well have fallen in love because it was just like dancing.

Sansa dreamt of Robb getting shot. She wasn’t the one pulling the trigger. Arya was.

Clegane was a in the gym. He greeted her with a nod.

She broke two bags that night and swept it up afterwards. Clegane stayed by her side.

**

Dr. Lewin smiled kindly.

**

Search: Robb Stark…

                        April 17, 1919- January 12, 1950

                                    “-assassinated-“

            “-government blamed it on Communist sympathizers”

                        “Was Robb Stark a member of the Communist Party before the war?”

“-conspiracy theory-“

                        “government cover up-“

**

Search: Bran Stark…

                        August 12, 1921- August 21, 1982

                                    “-peace summit-“

                        “-plane crash in Russia-“

            “blamed on faulty construction-“

**

Search: Rickon Stark…

                        May 30, 1923- November 7, 2011

            “-supersoldier serum-“

                                    “deterio-“

**

“Rough day?” Clegane asked, his voice even and blank as usual.

Sansa had just sent her third punching bag against the wall and it’d only been an hour. “Well,” she drawled, already hooking up a fourth, “I just found out that none of my siblings died a good death so yeah, it’s been a rough day.” Sandor grunted in acknowledgement, never even turning from his own punching bag. She drowned herself in the training, trying everything to block out words like “assassination,” “plane crash,” “deterioration.”

She couldn’t find the rhythm of it though. Her hands stuttered against the bag unevenly and she used too much force. It felt better than it had any right to though. Dr. Lewin could keep his coping mechanisms because what was deep breathing going to do about the rage roiling in her gut and those stupid tears that didn’t want to fall no matter horrible the information she found out was.

Clegane didn’t offer to box with her like he had most other nights and Sansa was grateful. Gloves or no, she was too emotional to reign in anything and he’d end up with something broken because right now, Sansa needed to break something because even if she couldn’t cry she could destroy. The fourth bag flew off its hook.

Later, Clegane was watching her sweep up sand when he spoke again: “I knew Rickon.” His voice was quiet, softer than she had come to associate with him and his heavy Russian accent. Sansa stopped sweeping and propped the broom against the wall.

She turned to look at him, feeling more scared than she had since she’d woken up in this world: “Was he happy?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. It was the only question that mattered.

Sandor looked back at her, his face almost unreadable. But Sansa was coming to know this steel-edged man, to read the minute facsimiles of his expressions. Right now, she thought he might look sad. Not for himself, not for Rickon, but, she realized, for her: “Да.” Sandor paused then, his eyes falling away from her and Sansa watched the expression of sadness grow on his face. “He talked about you. He would have liked to see you.”

“Me too,” Sansa said, not even trying to hide her bitterness.

Because Rickon had died one year before they had found her in the ice. One year, and she wouldn’t have woken up alone. And she wouldn’t have because Rickon and Bran had founded SHIELD and even after Bran died in the plane crash, Rickon kept fighting. He would have been there when they woke her from the ice. Brave, wild Rickon. He’d trained countless agents, received so many honors and medals and fought so many battles and then, in the end, the serum had corroded. He’d been fit and healthy for 71 years, had hardly aged from when he got the serum in 1940. And then, time caught up with him and he _degraded_.

It tore Sansa apart, thinking about that word. Her youngest brother, the tallest of them, the largest, and he _degraded_ into nothing. Into a husk. She’d seen the photos, had clicked on the comparison shots with a kind of sick fascination. On one side her brother was strong, dressed in army fatigues and smiling like he could own the world, and on the other, a shriveled old man in a wheel chair, a dusky reflection of the man he had once been, the gleam in his eyes only a faint glimmer.

Scientists suspected that it was because he’d been given a lesser version of the serum, weakened and not as refined. Sansa knew they were right. She had memories of her parents debating about it. Rickon had been so young and they had wanted to account for him completing puberty. They had apparently miscalculated. Although, with Robb dead from a coward’s bullet and Bran smashed against a mountainside, Sansa and Arya missing, there wasn’t really a point of comparison. It tore at Sansa because if they’d found her just a little bit sooner they could have studied _her_ , maybe would have found a cure for _him_.

“He helped me,” Clegane spoke up suddenly, drawing Sansa away from her thoughts. “I was- trying to get away from a bad place and break out of my- programing. And he helped me. He was a good man.”

It was the first time Clegane had spoken about his past. Sansa took in the guarded look on his face and recognized the statement for an act of trust. “Thank you for telling me, Sandor,” Sansa whispered. He nodded, for once not making a joke about her manners. She turned back to the broom and let the silence come back. He stayed with her while she cleaned, just like he always did.

**

Dr. Lewin smiled kindly.

**

It was a nice day and Central Park was as crowded as it ever was. The full assault of a New York summer hadn’t settled in yet and there was a nice breeze. Sansa sat on the lip of Bethesda Fountain and ignored the three agents trying to tail her covertly. There was a group in front her dancing and it astounded her, the way that their bodies moved. The men and women were rolling their bodies and moving their hips. Some threw flips and spun and their feet crossed back and forth and Sansa didn’t know how to describe it, only that she loved it. The music had a steady beat and repeated again and again. The rhythm coursed through her and it was electrifying, mesmerizing, almost intoxicating.

One of them was wearing a shirt that had “Brooklyn” splashed across it and it made her smile and ache a little. She hadn’t gone back to Brooklyn, not yet, even though sometimes that was all she wanted. SHIELD, or maybe Dr. Lewin, she wasn’t really sure who exactly was in charge of dictating her life, hadn’t deemed her ready for it. Something about the city being too much of a shock for her. But when Sansa was being honest with herself, and she always did try to be, she knew that she couldn’t face her old neighborhood yet. Too many ghosts. Or maybe not enough. She also knew that Brooklyn was calling to her and soon it wouldn’t matter if she was ready. She wouldn’t be able to resist going home.

It helped though, getting out of SHIELD HQ, getting to see at least a little bit of the city, even if wasn’t her city. Watching the dancing was good too. Maybe she’d learn it. That’d make Dr. Lewin happy. He didn’t think that the constant training was a good coping mechanism. He liked talking about coping mechanisms.

Out of the corner of her eye, Sansa saw Shireen approach. The agent was dressed in civilian clothes and it was jarring. At SHIELD, Shireen always looked so put together, not a hair out of place and steel in her spine. Out here in Central Park, in denims and a t-shirt (a look that Sansa still wasn’t used to), Shireen seemed looser, like she’d come unstarched. It was a good look.

Turning away from the dancing, Sansa greeted the agent. She could tell something was off, Shireen’s face pinched and a furrow in her brow. Instead of saying hello back, she lowered herself onto the lip of the fountain next to Sansa. She didn’t meet Sansa’s eyes either, instead turning to look at the dancers. There was something on her mind, something she was trying to put into words. Sansa let her take her time.

“I guess that dancing has to look pretty strange,” Shireen said, breaking the silence. It wasn’t what she had come to say but Sansa let her have this.

“It’s incredible. Do you know what it’s called?”

Shireen nodded slowly, distantly: “Break dancing.”

Shireen didn’t offer any more information and Sansa let the silence creep back. She could look it up later on the laptop.

After a moment, Shireen seemed to square her shoulders but she still didn’t look at Sansa: “Rickon and I were in love.” The statement was firm and confident. It wasn’t what Sansa was expecting to hear and it knocked the breath from her lungs.

Soldiering on, Shireen spoke again: “I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you sooner but I wasn’t sure how to say it. It’s hard, seeing you here when he’s not.”

“Do, do you,” Sansa paused, willing her voice to come out even. “Do you want to tell me about it?”

Shireen seemed oddly grateful for the opportunity because she smiled then and it spread across her face like sunshine. “He was the best person I ever met,” Shireen started and her voice was fond even though there was sadness in it. “You have to remember that he was a legend. Meeting him that first time was overwhelming. I tried so hard not to be star-struck, to treat him like any other agent, but the truth is that he was so much more than anybody else in the room and you’d have to be an idiot to miss it.”

Shireen laughed and Sansa smiled a little at the thought of her littlest brother having such an effect. She could remember when he was still picking his nose and playing in the mud and here this amazing agent was talking about her brother like she’d never known anyone so incredible. “He trained me. Well, not just me, but I was part of the group. We’d been hand selected because Rickon never really trained people but Rayder wanted us to learn from the best. And he was,” Shireen said earnestly. “He was the absolute best.”

“How did you fall in love?”

The question made Shireen smile even wider: “It was a mission in Prague, a couple months after the training ended. He’d requested to work with me specifically because we’d become friends. I’d stopped seeing him as this otherworldly creature because, let’s be honest, your brother could be a snarky piece of shit when he wanted to be. He used to try and convince new recruits that he once fought dinosaurs during world war two.”

“Did he ever convince them?” Sansa asked, laughing.

“Oh sure. None of them were going to question the Wilding, Howling Commando, brother of Captain America.” Sansa laughed again, enjoying the image of the new recruits staring at her brother with wide and dazzled eyes.

“But,” Shireen continued, sobering, “he was also so angry sometimes, and sometimes so tired. He kept it hidden away but he let me see that in him, trusted me with it, and that’s when I knew I loved him. Prague-Prague just brought it out in the open.”

“Most people forgot how old he was.” Shireen said and Sansa knew all too well what she meant. She remembered her brother’s glassy, far-off stare that he’d sometimes get when the Howling Commandos were out in the field. He’d already been so old back then, even when he was young. “They forgot that he’d been fighting his whole life; moving from one war to the next,” Shireen’s voice was quiet, the sadness creeping back in.

“Why did he keep going?” Sansa asked. The Rickon that she remembered had wanted nothing more than to go home. He was willing to fight the fight but Sansa had been able to tell that he was ready to go back to Brooklyn, hang up his hat and call it a day.

“I don’t think he knew how to do anything else,” Shireen answered. “I asked him once what he’d wanted to do, had wanted to be before the war started and he told me that he didn’t even remember.”

“I’ll always be a soldier,” Sansa whispered, her heart aching with the knowledge that Rickon had wanted to be a park ranger and live somewhere quiet.

Shireen looked at Sansa sharply; “That’s what he said, after the serum started to fail.”

“It was something Robb used to say,” Sansa said, not sure how to explain it. She hadn’t understood it herself, not really, back during the war. She had believed that all she had to do was get to the other side of the war and then she could marry Willas, maybe find a new company to dance with. Now here she was on the other side and she finally understood what Robb meant. Rickon must have too.

“Sometimes when we were holed up in one country or another, we’d talk about getting out. Leaving SHIELD and everything behind. I meant it but I could tell that he never did. He might have wanted to do it but he never would have,” Shireen said quietly with something that sounded very close to regret.

“How long were you together?”

“Almost 17 years,” Shireen answered and Sansa was surprised for a moment. She’d thought that she and Shireen were closer in age but if she and Rickon had been together that long- Sansa looked closer and she noticed the fine lines around Shireen’s eyes and mouth. The agent was older than she’d thought, closer to 40 than 30.

“Were you with him when-when,” Sansa stuttered, unable to finish the question.

“Up until the very end,” Shireen answered, her voice gentle, _caring_ in a way that Sansa hadn’t heard since she’d woken up.

“Good,” Sansa said. “I’m glad he didn’t die alone.” Shireen nodded and reached out to grab Sansa’s hand. Sansa took it and held on like a lifetime. She was selfishly glad that she wasn’t the only person mourning her brother for the man that he was instead of the legend that the world made him.

**

“Can you use the shield, Sergeant?” Rayder asked her without preamble.

Sansa was standing in his office, meeting with him for the first time since she’d been found. She’d been at SHIELD for a week, doing her monotonous routine of meetings and training. She’d been waiting for something to change, for some conclusion to be reached about her. She supposed that one had been found.

“Yes sir, all of the Howling Commandos can use the shield.” She didn’t mention that it had always felt just a little bit wrong to do so. That shield had been an extension of Robb, an extension of his arm, the reach of his fist.

Rayder seemed satisfied with the answer: “We want you to take up the shield and become Captain America.”

It took all of Sansa’s training as a covert agent not to blanch at the suggestion; “I’m sorry, sir. What?”

“Carry the mantle. This country needs a Captain America now, maybe more than it ever did.” Rayder turned from her to look out at the expanse of Manhattan outside his window. “This country is facing enemies that we can’t see, that we can’t put a name to and say, ‘yes, this is evil.’ Our new enemies are lurking out there, more powerful than we can imagine.” He turned back to her: “You ever heard of the Targaryens?”

The question threw Sansa off: “The mythological Valerian gods?”

“They’re not quite as mythological as we thought,” Rayder replied, his voice still even. “Two years ago, an artifact was found in the New Mexican desert; some sort of horn. It gave off a unique energy signature that caught our attention. We had it for a day before the sky opened up and _dragons_ came through a portal.” Sansa’s disbelief must have shown on her face because Rayder nodded, his eye wide and honest. “That is not a metaphor. They were dragons. Three of them. Then a man came flying after them, being chased by a woman who could light herself on fire,” Rayder leveled her with a dry look. “That town in New Mexico looked like a disaster sight after those two finished their grudge match. Thirty people died that day.”

His face twisted and he changed the subject suddenly, “What does Captain America mean to you?”

Sansa blinked, “Sir?”

“As a symbol,” Rayder clarified. “What does Captain America mean to you?”

Sansa considered for a moment before answering. Captain America had never been a real person. Robb was Captain America but Captain America had never been Robb. “He’s an ideal; a symbol for what this country, or the world I suppose, can and should be,” Sansa said finally.

Rayder nodded: “I believe the same thing. This world of ours is at one of its darkest points and it’s not just the threat of ancient alien dragon gods knocking at our front door. It’s the wars and the drones and the realpolitik.” Fixing his one eye on her, Rayder said, low and earnest, “This is a world that _needs_ Captain America.”

And it made sense, then, why Rayder wanted her. But- “I can’t be Captain America. I’m just…” Sansa paused, grappling for the words that would explain it right and came up short. “I’m just the Little Bird.” She finished lamely and looked down, not sure how to convey that Robb had always been the best of them, that he could be Captain America because out of all of them, he _believed_ in Captain America. And the rest of them had believed in Robb.

Director Rayder looked like he wanted to roll his eye. “Exactly,” he said. “You’re America’s Darling. Who better to take up the name of Captain America?”

Sansa flicked her eyes back to Rayder. Sandor had called her the same name but she’d brushed it off, not assigning it any consequence. “You have no idea who you are, do you, Sergeant?” Rayder asked and Sansa stayed silent.

“Computer, pull up images of America’s Darling.” The air filled with holographic images of Sansa, or upon closer inspection, pictures of Sansa and women meant to look like her. Sansa sucked a breath between her teeth.

Most of the pictures were from the war and the propaganda campaigns the Howling Commandos had been subjected to. Others were of actresses with their hair dyed red posing like models or from films and posters or pieces of art. One image seemed most popular; Sansa from the early years of the war, staring at the camera, her eyes half-lidded and a small smile on her lips, taken for some propaganda campaign. Her hair was done up in victory rolls and the text beneath it read “America’s Darling.” The phrase was everywhere in the search; scrolled beneath perfume ads or on movie posters, across pictures of a redhead and a brunet kissing. It made her more innocent than she had ever been in her entire life. Sansa understood then, what had happened. Sansa Stark had become an ideal; an image of innocence and goodness.

“The phrase first started popping up in the 1950s, right next to the invention of the teenager and suburbia. Your relationship with Willas, that wartime drama and romance- it became quite the story,” Rayder said and Sansa forced down her anger at the utter _invasion_ that had happened to her life. “Your brothers tried to fight it and said that you weren’t this sweet little lamb but, well, the media won that fight.”

Sansa smirked, a dry, humorless thing: “That’s an old fight, Director.”

Rayder regarded her for a moment before speaking again: “You understand why it has to be you, don’t you?”

Sansa did. If Captain America had been an image of what the world should be, America’s Darling was the result of such a world. Rayder, SHIELD, they were scared of what the world was becoming. They were scared of what could be coming to the world. They wanted a symbol, something to rally behind. Something to point to for hope and reassurance.

“You tortured me,” Sansa said and met Rayder’s eyes.

For a moment, he managed to look almost stunned: “Excuse me?”

“Five days ago you had scientists strap me to a chair and torture me,” Sansa repeated and to his credit, Rayder didn’t look away.

“SHIELD is cataloging your strengths and limits-“

“I know why you did it, but don’t try to hide it under a name that’s nice and clean. I’ve been tortured before, Director. I know what it looks like.” When Rayder didn’t say anything, Sansa continued. “You seem like a good man, sir. You’ve got a heart and it’s even in the right place. But I don’t trust you, and I don’t trust SHIELD.” She watched his eye harden. “I want to be Captain America. I want to help, I do. But I won’t be your lapdog. I pick my missions and who I run them with.”

Robb had become Captain America because he couldn’t stand aside and not help, not when it would be something as simple as wearing a certain uniform and painting a metal disc. But he’d let himself go to do it. He’d let himself be owned. Sansa couldn’t do that.

Rayder didn’t say anything for a long moment, didn’t look away. Sansa held his gaze. Finally, he nodded. “I can see the Stark in you,” he said, then sighed. “Alright, we do this on your terms.”

Sansa nodded and she knew that it’d be harder than this to actually keep him to his word. It was a start though.

“Looks like you got a promotion, Captain,” Rayder said and shook her hand.

Sansa walked out of Director Rayder’s office carrying Robb’s vibranium shield. She walked out with a bitter taste in her mouth, trying to stave off the feeling of wrongness.

**

“Thief,” Robb accuses, his eyes dead.

“Thief,” he hisses, hands cold.

You close your eyes and tremble; a cold wind burns through you.

“Thief,” he whispers and kisses your forehead.

**

Sansa’s eyes flickered open and she couldn’t move. She wasn’t surprised.

**

Dr. Lewin smiled kindly.

**

Sansa sat in her room reading a biography on Joseph McCarthy.

Time slipped.

Sansa blinked and noticed the book had fallen to the floor and the cup of tea she’d been drinking was cold. Sansa blinked and stood up from her chair, her joints creaking. Glancing at the clock, Sansa winced. She’d lost at least two hours.

Sansa blinked again and looked at the shield leaning against the door.

She picked up the book.

**

The tests didn’t stop after Rayder gave her the shield. The scientists just got more creative. They timed her going through obstacle courses, tested her tactical skills, her stealth. At one point they gave her a table of weapons to choose from to complete a disaster simulation. They didn’t notice that she’d slipped a knife into her boot. The weight of it was comforting, familiar.

She practiced with the shield on her own too, trying to get past the feeling of wrongness. Sansa was in one of HQ’s larger training rooms, leaping from sawhorse to sawhorse, throwing the shield at dummies that randomly popped up from the floor. The shield hit the dummy square in the chest and Sansa vaulted across the room, catching it in midair, before landing and throwing it again at the next dummy that popped up.

Sansa been there for almost an hour when she heard the gym door open but she ignored it. She’d been training herself to do the math and work out the angles rather than just relying on instinct. Sansa had just caught the shield again when she heard the telltale click of a gun being cocked. She leapt back off of the sawhorse, flipping and landing with in a crouch, shield up and deflecting the bullet.

Sansa sprang into action, eyeing the man who was drawing a bead on her. Arcing her back, she heaved the shield at him, hitting him square in the chest. It ricocheted against the wall and back into Sansa’s waiting hand. The man flew back, crashing against the back wall and Sansa charged him, shield in front.

He was laughing.

Sansa pulled up short, still alert, and heard someone clapping. “I told you that you wouldn’t be able to hit her, Bronn,” a woman called out, sauntering into the training room. Her voice was light, tinkling. Playful. Sansa knew in an instant that she couldn’t trust this woman. Maybe as a comrade, but not as a friend. She was a spy in every way.

“Had to try, didn’t I?” the man, Bronn, answered. He lifted his hands up, shrugging in a _whatareyougonnadoaboutit_ gesture. “Sorry about that, love. Just testing the new meat.”

Sansa arched an eyebrow at him: “Love?”

“Just ignore him. I do,” the woman said, reaching out her hand. Sansa shifted the shield to her other arm and took it, giving it a firm shake.

“Sansa Stark,” she said, introducing herself.

The woman laughed: “I know. Agent Margaery Tyrell.”

Sansa’s breath caught and her shock must have shown because Agent Tyrell laughed again: “Yes, the same family. He was my grandfather.”

Sansa hadn’t even thought about Willas having children, hadn’t even googled him and now his _granddaughter_ was shaking her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Sansa said, flying on autopilot.

In a daze, she watched Tyrell turn to Bronn and help him stand. “Good hit,” he said, rubbing at his chest and eyeing the shield in Sansa’s hand.

Mentally shaking herself, Sansa turned to him: “Sorry about that.”

He turned his head to Willas’ granddaughter, shaking it in mock disbelief: “I shoot at her as a test and she apologizes. I like her. You should be more like her.” The grin on his face was natural and it made his eyes crinkle. Despite his obvious jovial nature, Sansa knew that, just like Tyrell, she couldn’t trust him.

“Next time, I won’t be as nice about it,” Sansa said with a smile but she knew that they would read it as the warning that it was.

Looking between the pair of them, Sansa could see how dangerous they were. They cloaked it behind light gestures and easy smiles but she could tell that it was practiced. Arya was the same way, or at least had become that way, close to the end of the war. Both of them moved with a practiced casualness, one bred from being hardened by a dangerous world.

“Well, don’t let us keep you from your training, Captain,” Tyrell smirked, one side of her lips pulling up. It looked like a trap. Sansa nodded and walked back to the sawhorses. They followed her, stopping nearby and leaning against the wall.

The two stayed to watch and Sansa found herself studying them as she leapt through the air. Their closeness was obvious. The touches lingered and the smiles turned genuine, if just for a moment. Sansa saw it and labeled it love, or something like it. It was obvious that they were partners and, if she had to guess, out of all the people in the world they only trusted each other. It was what made them so dangerous.

They were huddled close together, urgent whispers being exchanged. Sansa knew that if she wanted to, she’d be able to listen to them with her enhanced hearing but chose to block them out, give them privacy. They seemed to reach a decision about something because they both turned to look at her at the same time.

“You should spar with us.” Tyrell had that smirk on her face and Bronn was all-out grinning.

Sansa jumped down from one of the taller sawhorses and nodded to them. “Any rules?” she asked. They both shook their heads and moved out onto the floor. She set the shield off to the side before going to meet them on the mat.

“Rayder set you up to this?” Sansa asked.

“Of course,” Tyrell responded. “But we love a good fight.”

Sansa spent most of the fight on the defensive as they paired up against her; she was more interested in learning their tactics than actually fighting. Bronn was a direct fighter; he charged her and swung heavy fists. But he was also a distraction from Tyrell. She was quick and catlike, all of her moves smooth and deadly. She and Shireen fought similarly although Tyrell was much more vicious. Sansa wondered if Rickon had trained her too.

She quickly discovered that Bronn was a talker. He goaded her and tried to make her lash out. Most of it was harmless enough, simple jabs at her technique or if she didn’t react fast enough. It was easy to block him out. Rickon had done the same thing to all of them. It made her lips tug up in a small smile.

They’d been sparring for close to an hour when Sansa heard the gym door open again, followed by a familiar walk. She rolled away from Tyrell’s kick and gave Sandor a quick wave before turning her attention back to the fight, noting the man who followed him in.

“Hound!” Bronn shouted, pulling out of the fight. Tyrell lunged at her again though so Sansa kept at it. With Bronn out, Sansa felt more comfortable moving to the offensive, driving the other woman back.

“Sellsword,” Sandor responded, his voice as gruff as ever.

“Come to join the fight? Or were you just going to lurk in the shadows some more?” Bronn’s voice lacked any edge to it, there might have even been a fondness.

“But he lurks so well!” Tyrell called out, barely managing to block Sansa’s kick.

“Already fought her,” Sandor answered. He stopped by the mat and began to stretch. “She’s good.” A part of Sansa swelled to hear the compliment.

“Well, that’s a Stark for you; always ready for a fight. But let’s hope she’s a little different from the others,” the other man said. Sansa looked away from the fight, narrowing her eyes at him. He was tall and walked as if he owned the world. His hair was a golden shade of blonde that he wore in a style that would have fit in with Sansa’s time. The man was almost achingly beautiful.

Sansa yanked on Tyrell’s arm, using the momentum to throw her to the mat. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked, bristling at the man’s insinuation.

Tyrell tried to stand. Sansa slammed her down again, using more strength than she meant to. “Starks. All the strength, none of the brains,” the man said, shrugging.

“Lannister,” Sandor warned, his eyes flashing between the two of them.

Sansa froze, a pit of fire in her stomach, and Tyrell managed to squirrel her way back to her feet, moving away from Sansa. Sansa let her, focusing all her attention on whoever the man was. Lannister apparently. Out of her periphery she could see Sandor watching her warily, Bronn’s stance defensive. Tyrell also seemed to notice the obvious tension rolling off of Sansa and didn’t make another move to continue the fight. Lannister continued talking, blasé: “Let’s be honest here. Anything special about a Stark came out of a bottle.”

Sansa broke. She lunged at Lannister with a shout. He didn’t have time to react before she tackled him to the mat. Sansa pressed one knee against his chest and braced the other on the floor. The man tried to rise and Sansa slammed his shoulders back down. Pulling out the knife she wasn’t supposed to have, Sansa shoved it against his throat. It was sickly satisfying to see how the skin whitened under the blade.

“Give me a reason,” Sansa’s hissed. “Insult my family again. I dare ya. I fuckin’ _dare_ ya.”

Lannister said nothing, just stared back at her with wide eyes. Slowly, he lifted his hands and made a gesture of surrender. Sansa glared at him, the anger still thrumming through her. He nodded after a moment and Sansa forced herself to rise and let him go. The blonde man stood lazily and made a show of wiping off dust from his suit. Sansa scowled. He practically stunk of money.

“Yeah. A Stark through and through,” Lannister said, a smirk stretched across his face. Sansa raised her knife again, pointing it at him. The smirk faltered.

“Leave it, Jaime.” Tyrell called out, her voice sharp. Sansa turned to look at the other woman. Tyrell gave Sansa a nod before turning her gaze back to the blonde man. “That might have been one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen you do. And you threatened an international terrorist on TV once.”

“She’s not wrong,” Bronn spoke up, but his eyes were still trained on Sansa and the knife in her hand.

“What are you doing here, Lannister?” Tyrell asked.

He shrugged, “Hacked some files, found out about Rayder’s little frozen surprise. I got curious. It’s not every day you get to meet America’s Darling,” Lannister turned to her and his eyes looked her up and down. Sansa’s grip on the knife tightened. “I can’t say I’m disappointed.”

“Fuck off,” Sandor barked, squaring himself in front of the smaller man. His eyes were hard and dangerous.

“She the one holding your leash now, Hound?” Lannister drawled. Sandor bristled but Bronn put a hand on his shoulder.

“Who _are_ you?” Sansa broke in, trying her hardest to keep her anger under control.

The smirk was practically smeared across his face as he said, “Jaime Lannister, Iron Man, genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. I answer to all of them.”

“You forgot jackass,” Bronn interjected, looking amused.

“I’m wounded,” Lannister turned to the agent, hand on his heart.

“Bronn, let’s go. We have a debriefing,” Tyrell spoke up, cutting Lannister a glare. “You’re coming too. You two can rip each other up later,” she motioned between Sansa and Lannister.

With a flourish, Lannister trailed behind the agent. Bronn did the same put with a smile, calling out to her over his shoulder, “See you later, love!”

“Still not your love!” Sansa shot back and was surprised to find that liked him a little bit despite everything. Lannister, though, was a completely different pill.

After the door swung shut behind them, Sansa let herself collapse onto the mat, pushing the anger out of her. She was distinctly aware of Sandor’s eyes on her. They felt heavy against her skin. Closing her eyes, Sansa willed the tension to leave her shoulders. “Sorry ‘bout that,” Sansa murmured even if she wasn’t sure that she meant it.

Sandor laughed, the same dry sound from their first meeting. It made Sansa smile. “Don’t go back to your manners now, милая. Not after that shit.”

Sansa rolled her head to the side, raising her eyebrows in amusement because even if she didn’t know Russian, she could recognize a pet name when she heard one. Sandor sat down beside her, sitting with his legs splayed in front of him, leaning back on his hands. Even in repose he looked deadly. “I didn’t think I’d ever hear you say fuck,” he mused. “If America could hear its darling now.”

It was Sansa’s turn to laugh: “It’s like people forgot I was in the army. Or that I had three brothers and a sister like Arya. I grew up Irish and poor in Brooklyn fer chrissakes..”

It warmed Sansa when Sandor grinned back at her. They stayed that way for a moment before his smile fell away into his familiar scowl: “People see what they want to see.”

“Yeah,” she whispered, “the world’s got a way of forgettin’ the important things.”

Her eyes wandered back to Sandor: “We are… _were_ ,” Sansa corrected herself, “more than what came out of a bottle.”

“I know, милая.” He said it so quietly that she almost missed it.

“The serums were a parta us, ya know,” Sansa continued. “But we were always more’n that. So much more.”

Sandor didn’t say anything back for a moment, just held her gaze. His expression was unreadable: “You try to hide your accent,” he said. “You shouldn’t.”

“Why not?” Sansa asked.

Sandor lifted a hand and waved it over Sansa: “You hide behind your manners and your polite smiles. You’re so covered in lies that sometimes I think you’re nothing _but_ lies.” Sansa winced but couldn’t fault him for it. She’d wondered the same thing sometimes during the war.

“But then you tackle a man and hold a knife to his throat and that Brooklyn accent comes bleeding out of you and I figure there must be more to you than that,” Sandor shrugged and looked away, suddenly uncomfortable.

Sansa couldn’t help her smile. This big, gruff, _violent_ man, upturned by his emotions. It made Sansa like him. “Would it ruin the whole thing if I said thank you?” she asked, surprised at her own teasing.

His reply wasn’t quite a laugh but his smile seemed genuine enough. He didn’t say anything though, instead choosing to start stretching again. Sansa kept the silence, relishing it in a way that she hadn’t during her own time. The new world was so loud that it made Sansa want to burrow into Sandor’s silence, made her want to sleep in it.


	4. Our Hero Feebly Answered Yes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thanks to arashi-opera and zmeischa over at livejournal for helping me with the Russian in this chapter. It's been much appreciated. Also, I'd like to note that there is use of the q--- slur in this chapter. I'm using it because of it's historical accuracy but I thought I'd give a warning.

“No.”

“There have been literally hundreds of sightings over the past decade-“

“Nope.”

“There are photos-“

“Bronn-“

“No, look. This one, the New York Times-“

“Bronn, I-“

“Batman has been protecting this city for years-“

“Bronn, I read the first Batman comic.”

“What?”

“Bran read Detective Comics. He lent it to me.”

“Well, damn.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, well there’s a school for wizards and witches in England.”

“Shireen already gave me the first book.”

**

“How did you sleep?” Dr. Lewin asked.

“Fine.”

“Any dreams or nightmares?”

Sansa paused, considering: “I wake up screaming most nights.”

Dr. Lewin looked surprised for a moment. Then he schooled his features back into a gentle smile.

“Do you want to talk about the nightmares?” he asked.

He knew that she was lying. So, that meant audio mics in her room. Alright. She could work with that.

**

On her second day, Shireen had given Sansa another bag of supplies- more essentials. Things like jeans, shirts and underwear. Makeup. SHIELD seemed to think that Sansa needed a lot of makeup. Or that maybe she would want it. After seeing all the images of America’s Darling, Sansa couldn’t blame them.

Twisting the bottom of the tube, Sansa pushed the red lipstick up and up; it caught the glint of the light and it was ripe and deep. Sansa pressed it against her lips and the color smeared on. It went on easy, so much smoother than anything she’d ever been able to afford. Once, some fella she’d been seeing had bought her a tube of Montezuma Red from Macy’s as a birthday gift. Sansa had coveted it for years, carried it with her to the war and kept it safe through everything. Rubbing her lips together, Sansa evened out the lipstick. She pressed a napkin to her mouth and drew it away. A perfect impression of her lips; suitable for any letter she ever sent Willas.

She ran the pencil over her eyebrows next in a motion she’d perfected by the time she was 18. Sally down at the Aladdin had taken her aside one night early on and shown her how to flick her wrist just right, how to make the pointed shape. Sansa had thought it made her look mysterious and when she got older, she knew how to bat her eyes just like Barbara Stanwyck and the joes had fallen in line. SHIELD hadn’t given her Vaseline to shape her eyebrows, but Sansa was used to making due without it. She hadn’t even had a pencil for most of the war, had lost it somewhere in Italy.

The mascara went on heavier than she would have liked and coupled with the eyeliner, it made her eyes darker, sadder than she normally would have done. The brand was Maybelline, which was at least familiar- not that she’d ever owned it. Stella had though and Sansa had always wanted to try it out. The rouge was last, like always, because Sansa had never liked it much. She thought it always looked so garish on her freckles, clownish, and she’d only ever used a dash. She’d forgone it completely during the war except for the rare nights when Willas would take her out.

Sansa stepped back from the mirror and let herself look. She’d rolled her hair in ribbons the night before- strips from a shirt- and so it curled gently against her shoulders in loose waves. SHIELD hadn’t thought to give her any pins though, so she couldn’t do her hair up in her usual rolls and it made Sansa feel incomplete somehow. Like she was only half there in the mirror.

Sighing, Sansa dropped her eyes and idly pushed the tube of lipstick across the lips of the sink. It tipped over and clattered into the bowel, rolling up and down the sides before spinning for a moment at the bottom. Picking it up-

Sansa frowned down at her unpainted nails. If she was meant to be dancing tonight then she’d have to paint them. She’d used the last of hers the other night and hadn’t been out to the drugstore yet. And goodness knows Arya wouldn’t have any. It’d be easier painting the claws of the tabby out back than getting Arya to put varnish on her nails. Connie would have some but Sansa wasn’t sure that she was working tonight. Stella would too but, well, it was Stella and her fist was wrapped tighter ‘round her cosmetics than Hoover’s around a dollar. Sansa’s brow furrowed as she considered. She’d have to recount what was in the coffee can before she went over to Hal’s Drugstore. She’d already set aside the $5 for the rent this week, and the money for Ma’s new coat and then there was the money for the fish on Friday- although it’d have to be cod again- and they were almost out of coffee and Sansa refused to live with an Arya who didn’t have coffee and old Mrs. Brubaker had been complaining about rats so she’d need to get a couple of traps because their landlord sure wasn’t going to do anything about it and really, what was nail polish when she could put those extra pennies in the jar for Bran but maybe if she-

There was a knock and Sansa gasped, stumbling away from the mirror and suddenly it was 2012 again because this bathroom was so much nicer than anything she’d ever dreamed of and the knock came again. Sansa pulled in a breath that rattled its way through her body, shook her down to her core. She was cold, so cold, and Sansa made herself step out of the bathroom, made herself shake out the ice creeping her in veins, made herself remember that Arya was dead and wouldn’t need coffee anymore so she might as well open the door.

The man standing on the other side almost made her freeze anyway because she would know that long face anywhere and her father’s face had no place being coupled with the navy and white of the SHIELD uniform. Sansa made herself blink. She blinked again. The man’s hair was wrong, curly where her father’s had always hung straight, and black instead of brown, but the brow and the nose and the cheekbones and-

“I’m so sorry,” Sansa said, wrenching her eyes to meet his. “You just look a lot like-“

“Eddard Stark, yes,” the man said, and his eyes crinkled up at the corners in a smile that made Sansa’s chest ache. “He was my great uncle; your aunt Lyanna was my grandmother.”

“So you-we’re,” Sansa’s throat caught.

“Family,” the man said with that same smile. “My name is Agent Jon Snow. I’d have introduced myself earlier but I’ve been out of country. It’s an honor to meet you, Sergeant.” He stuck his hand out and then suddenly the smile faltered and his eyes widened almost comically. “Captain, I meant captain. I’ve spent so many years thinking of you as Sergeant Sansa Stark, it’s a little hard to get used to.”

The joy building up in Sansa suddenly went cold because no, that wasn’t right. To family she was just, just- “Just Sansa is fine."

“Alright, Sansa,” the agent said passively. “Call me Jon,” he said as she took his hand and shook it.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Jon,” Sansa smiled and it stretched easy across her lips. “I was gonna go down to lunch soon. You hungry? I’ve been readin’ restaurant reviews and there’s a place round the corner that’s supposed to be aces.”

“I’m sorry, Captain, but lunch will have to wait. Rayder sent me to show you your uniform. If you’d follow me,” Jon said and gestured out into the hallway and stepped back. Sansa’s smile waned. She moved to leave but he stopped her: “Oh, bring the shield, huh?”

“Course,” she said, grabbing it and stepping out of the white room.

“I’m free tomorrow though, if you’d like to get lunch then,” the agent said as he started down the hallway. “I’m sure you’ve got some stories to tell. My grandmother loved to talk about the Howling Commandos. She was always very proud.”

Sansa kept the frown off of her face. If Aunt Lyanna had been proud she’d sure had a funny way of showing it, shutting the door in their faces and lookin’ down her nose and all because she’d married that bloke up in Park Slope. “Lunch would be great,” she said instead. “I don’t have much on the schedule these days.”

“I’m sure that’ll change soon. Rayder has plans for Captain America,” Jon said, glancing at her and his smile was almost boyish in its giddiness and admiration. “We’re going to turn this country around. Just wait and see, Cap.”

“Sansa,” she correctly softly, already knowing it wouldn’t take.

The agent laughed: “Sorry, right. SHIELD loves its titles.”

Sansa nodded and Jon hit the down button on the elevator.

“Alright, Cap. SHIELD techs have designed your new uniform based off of the stats we’ve gotten from the tests we’ve run so far. That means it’s going to be optimal for hand to hand combat and maneuverability. It’s impact resistant, but it won’t stop a bullet, just soften blows and falls. We’ve added a utility belt and pouches and you’ve been given clearance to SHIELD’s armory,” Jon told her as they rode the car down. It came out like he’d recited it in front of the mirror.

The elevator doors opened to a floor Sansa had never been to; one of the basement levels. The walls and floor were concrete, the space cavernous. As they walked, Sansa had to step aside to let an agent in a small loading car drive by. Jon kept describing the mechanics of the suit, something about it being “ventilating” and “stain resistant” and Sansa wanted to shake him and beg him to please just look at her without the stars and stripes in his eyes.

Agent Snow led her through the basement level. He turned down a hallway that was lined mostly with what seemed to be storage rooms and weapons lockers. Eventually, he motioned her through a door. It opened to a small storage room. It was mostly empty but at the far end was a display case holding her uniform. It was set up almost like a shrine; the whole uniform on display and the image of the shield behind it.

Sansa had never worn a uniform. Sure, her apron and the cute little hat down at Murdock’s had been one, but Sansa had never had- she’d never been a symbol. The war had been deep blues and blacks, heavy wool and scratching out dried blood. Sansa had dressed for the shadows because she’d lived in them. The uniform in front of her was made for sunlight and speeches and hope and the Little Bird- Sansa had only ever done what was needed of her.

Agent Snow pressed a string of numbers into a keypad and the display case slid open. Sansa stepped forward and rubbed the fabric between her fingers. It was lighter than she expected, softer too. Sansa’s fingers started to shake and she snatched her hand back. “Thank you, Agent. It’s wonderful,” she said, forcing the words to come out even.

He smiled at her, pleased: “You’re welcome to try it on. I could step out for a moment-”

“You know, I’d like that. Thanks,” Sansa plastered on her most excited smile. The agent stepped out of the room, his smile matching hers.

Sansa braced herself against the wall and shook all over. She shook and shook and the tears didn’t come but the ice did and it coated her throat and ripped right through her and she had let herself think that maybe he could be family but that damned uniform-

“You ruined everything,” she hissed. “Why couldn’t you have just stayed dead?”

**

It was easy to get what she needed from Central Park. People forgot things there all the time. Sansa could work with that.

**

Dr. Lewin had been relentless, pushing her to talk about her “unhealthy coping mechanisms” and how maybe spending all night training wasn’t the best for her, mentally.  She’d make herself face that later but right now all Sansa wanted to do was collapse and take a nap but when she opened the door and saw Agent Tyrell sprawled against her bed, Sansa knew it wasn’t going to happen.

“Does the future not care about privacy?” Sansa asked, resigned.

Agent Tyrell ignored the question and spoke before Sansa had walked through the door: “I’ve come to take you shopping.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary,” Sansa replied, moving into the room. She left the door open.

“I’ve seen your closet, Captain. It’s more than necessary.”

Sansa glanced down at herself. She was wearing the standard SHIELD uniform. Tyrell, in contrast, was wearing a black H-line skirt, straight and narrow, and a loose green blouse, sharp stilettos on her feet. SHIELD had given Sansa clothes, mostly jeans and plain t-shirts and Sansa had never thought twice about it because there had just been so much…else.

Sansa had always considered herself stylish, had preened in front of mirrors because she may have been living in a rundown flat in Fulton Landing but Sansa had taken pride in how she dressed.  She’d worked hard at it too, scrimping and saving for fabric and make-up, a good mirror. Arya hadn’t cared a lick for the primping, but it was what Sansa had, sometimes all she had.

“It’ll be fun,” Agent Tyrell goaded, smirking.

Sansa considered for a moment. She wasn’t sure if it actually would be fun, but she hadn’t really had a chance to go out into the city yet. The idea instantly appealed to Sansa. She ached for the opportunity to leave SHIELD HQ behind, to go farther than Central Park and walk in her city.

“Sure,” Sansa said. Ruefully she thought about how, for the first time in her life, Sansa could afford it. There had been a dizzying conversation about paygrades and back pay and hazard pay and about a half other dozen forms of pay that all meant that Sansa had a bank account that didn’t seem real.

“Thank god. I thought I was going to have to force you,” Agent Tyrell laughed again.

Sansa dug out the credit card that SHIELD had given her out of the desk drawer and slipped it into her pocket, along with the phone. She glanced up and noticed Agent Tyrell giving her a skeptical look. Sansa just shrugged: “SHIELD didn’t give me a purse.”

Agent Tyrell actually rolled her eyes at that before telling her to change into street clothes and sauntering out of the room. Sansa did and then followed her out, feeling more excited than she had expected to.

The Manhattan air hit her with a jolt of familiarity. It was a smell so specific to New York that even 70 years couldn’t change it. Without thinking, Sansa asked, “Could we go to Brooklyn? There’ve gotta be shops there.”

“Williamsburg has some wonderful boutiques,” Agent Tyrell considered. “We’d have to get a car though.”

“Oh, god. Don’t tell me they got rid of the subway,” Sansa gasped, mocking.

Agent Tyrell raised an eyebrow: “You want to bus to Brooklyn?”

“Well I sure as Sunday ain’t takin’ a car,” Sansa said, making her way to where she knew she could catch M line. “C’mon, Tyrell. Afraid of gettin' grime on your boots?”

Agent Tyrell laughed before catching up to her, a bright and sunny sound that Sansa was almost sure was genuine: “You don’t even have cash for the fare.”

Sansa turned to her and grinned, “What? You never jumped the turnstile?”

“Oh, and you did?”

“Almost every Thursday night since 1938. How else was I supposed to get to Harlem?” As they reached the subway, Sansa held out her hand to the agent. “How about that fare, Tyrell? Don’t get stingy on me now.” And god, wasn't it a thing that even the subway felt the same?

Agent Tyrell just looked at Sansa for a moment, studying her. For once, Sansa didn’t really mind. She was flying high on the idea of Brooklyn. With a small shake of her head, Tyrell pulled a couple of dollars out of her bag and handed them over: “You’re nothing like what my grandfather described.”

Sansa’s smile faltered. It’d been almost two weeks since SHIELD had woken her up and she hardly ever thought about Willas. She’d loved him, of course she had, but the loss of him felt more distant, less consuming. 

Tyrell seemed to misinterpret Sansa’s reaction. “He really did love you,” she said, putting her hand on Sansa’s shoulder. “He always talked like you were the most wonderful woman he’d ever met. It drove my grandmother crazy sometimes, having to compete with you.”

 Sansa frowned: “She shouldn’t have had to do that.”

 To her surprise, Agent Tyrell only laughed. “Don’t worry. She never let him get away with it.”

 “I’m glad,” Sansa answered, getting distracted as the train came into view and Sansa felt the excitement building in her again. She’d been getting desperate to see Brooklyn, had even gotten so far as to look up the new bus routes. She hadn’t been back since the Starks had left for the war and she’d missed it then just as much as she missed it now. And now she was so close she could almost taste it.

 Tyrell spoke again as the train pulled away from the station: “Although I suppose it didn’t help that he was the one that started the America’s Darling craze.”

 “I’m sorry, what?” Sansa asked, not quite following and hoping that she’d misunderstood because, no, that couldn’t be right. The idea that Willas had been the one that turned her into some kind of image, something so unlike how she actually was, was startling. More than that, it hurt.

 “He wanted to make sure that the world remembered you as more than just a soldier. Like I said, he really did love you. I think he loved you until the day he died.” Tyrell was smiling, like this knowledge was a kindness.

 Sansa had thought that he’d known her well enough to see the cracks. They’d met at the beginning of the war, before the trenches, before Sansa had been captured, before-“I loved him too. He was such a good man,” Sansa forced the words out. It was an honest statement even if her smile wasn’t. She had thought that Willas could see it in her, the way that the war took everything that it did.

 “Oh, I know you loved him. I’ve seen the movie reels of you two at the SSR headquarters. Grandfather would watch them over and over again. I grew up wanting to be just like you. Of course, then I joined SHIELD,” Tyrell said with that twist of her lips that was starting to become familiar.

 You may be more like than me than you think, Sansa thought. “Why did you join SHIELD,” she asked, desperate to change the subject from Willas and the ball of betrayal twisting in her.

 Tyrell’s eyes turned just a little harder even if the smirk stayed and Sansa knew that whatever the agent was about to tell her would only be a half-truth. “Well, it was that or become a New York socialite and Grandfather always made SHIELD sound like an adventure, having helped found it and all.”

 “Is it? An adventure?”

 “It’s certainly been exciting. Not many people can say that they’ve chased mercenaries across roof tops with a bit of stick and string from the Paleolithic era.” The glint in Tyrell’s eyes was hard, and very, very cold. 

**

Sansa went to the New York Public Library. It was big enough to force the agents to be in the same room with her but crowded enough where it wouldn’t make them feel like they had been made.

She went on one of the public computers and started researching her city, opening multiple windows at once. She didn’t want them to know that she was only looking at new maps.

SHIELD had lowered the number of agents that tailed her. Now there were only three. She could work with three. One agent kept getting distracted by a man who’d thrown him a wink. He was one of the usuals- Agent Donahue. He’d be the easiest to lose.

**

When the train surfaced to make its way across the Williamsburg Bridge, Sansa lost her ability to keep up any conversation with Tyrell because there it was. There was home. The buildings spread towards her and for a moment Sansa felt like she was being hurled forwards uncontrollably. For the first time in her life she would be in Brooklyn and there wouldn’t be any Stark in any part of the borough. Sansa was terrified and she was thrilled and she wanted it so bad she thought she might die of the wanting.

Softly, Tyrell spoke beside her: “Sansa, how old are you?”

Still caught up in the approaching buildings, Sansa answered without thinking: “25.”

The agent beside her didn’t respond and Sansa couldn’t bring herself to care, not yet. Right now, all she wanted was to get off this train and lose herself in the city. Maybe they could go to Prospect Park or see if Murdock's was still open or if Red's Dance Hall was still on Flatbush. Maybe the Fitzpatrick family still owned the market on Clinton. Maybe she could still go to Coney Island and ride the Cyclone until she threw up. And even if all of that was gone, it wouldn’t matter because the Brooklyn Bridge was still there and that had always been there and it had always been her favorite part of this whole damn city.

Still grinning, Sansa swiveled to look at Tyrell. The woman looked thoughtful as she stared at Sansa, as if realizing something that she hadn’t considered before. “Sometimes I forget how young you are,” she said finally, her voice still soft.

Sansa shrugged: “If it makes you feel any better I’ll be 93 in July.”

Tyrell fell quite beside her and Sansa didn’t mind. They’d crossed the bridge and were underground again but the thrumming in Sansa hadn’t subsided. Just a few more minutes and they’d be getting off in Williamsburg. It wasn’t a part of the borough she’d gone to often, even though she’d worked a couple of odd dance halls there, but home was home.    

Tyrell seemed to have recovered by the time they were going up the stairs out of the subway: “I thought we could go to some of the vintage shops they have here. I’ve been to a few and they have some nice things in this neighborhood.”

“Vintage?” Sansa asked, keeping her voice neutral.

“I thought you might like something familiar,” Tyrell replied, her unique smile coming back.

Sansa shook her head: “Take me somewhere new.” Tyrell looked surprised for a moment before smiling and leading the way.

The first store was brightly lit with wood floors and tall glass doors. It was some little boutique and the pristine décor made Sansa aware of the blue jeans she was wearing, the plainness of her purple shirt. It reminded her of all the stores she had wanted to shop at but had never had the money to do it. The clothing was beautiful, she supposed, soft pastels and flowing skirts. Summer clothes.

Glancing at the price tag of a pair of jeans, Sansa’s eyes widened. “Tyrell,” she hissed, drawing the woman’s attention. “These are $300.”

The agent’s lips lifted in their little half smirk. “They’re name brand and a fantastic quality.”

“It’s still $300,” Sansa protested.

“That’s how much my blouse cost,” Tyrell countered and Sansa could see the whole thing was amusing her.

“You can’t tell me this is the average cost of clothes now,” Sansa said, disbelief bleeding into her voice.

This time Tyrell actually laughed. “It’s the average if you really want the quality. I promise you that those jeans will be the most comfortable ones you find.”

By now one of the employees was looking at them with the polite judgment that only New Yorkers can have. Sansa ignored her. “I can’t do it, Tyrell. There has to be somewhere cheaper than this.”

“But you can afford it! And besides, don’t you think you deserve the best?”

Sansa paused, trying to think of a way to make Tyrell understand that she just couldn’t do it. That she didn’t need to, that she didn’t want to. “These pants are six times what my rent used to be. I’ve never owned a dress that cost more than $2 and I made most of mine and my sister’s clothing on a sewing machine I got at a pawn shop for $10.”

“And now you can have more!” Tyrell insisted and Sansa shook her head.

“I don’t need more. I’ve never needed more.”

Tyrell rolled her eyes but conceded: “You really are nothing like I expected.”

Sansa followed the agent out of the shop.“What did you expect America’s Darling to be?” she asked, irritation prickling at her skin.

“Grandfather always described you as sweet and kind and gentle. I suppose I thought you would be- softer. Audrey Hepburn- she was an actress- became famous for playing you in a movie called Brooklyn Sweet. It was all about your ballet career and-“

“I wasn’t a ballerina,” Sansa interrupted, confused.

Tyrell shot her a look: “Grandfather said you were a dancer. So do the history books.”

“Yeah, I danced, just not ballet,” Sansa replied, not adding that it had been a childhood dream of hers that crashed about the same time the economy did.

“But Grandfather told stories about watching you do ballet,” Tyrell insisted.

Sansa wanted to laugh. Even if she did know ballet there certainly hadn’t been time for it during the war. She’d been lucky to go out dancing once a month. Sansa debated for a moment whether she should tell Tyrell the truth or let the agent cling to the stories Willas had told her. She decided to take a sort of middle ground: “Willas always liked it when I danced, no matter what kind it was.”

“So,” Tyrell continued, “You’re not a ballerina, you’re not bashful and doe-eyed and you certainly aren’t soft or sweet or innocent. Is there any part of the America’s Darling legend that is true?”

Sansa did laugh this time and she managed to keep the bitterness out of it. “I don’t know, do people say anything about her having a mean right hook?”

“Feminists do,” Tyrell grinned.

“What do they say about me?” Sansa asked, smiling back because that meant she’d done her friends down at the Radical Women’s League proud.

“That you’re the peak of femininity and strength all at the same time. Kicking ass in stilettos, curling your hair while punching out bad guys, that sort of thing.” 

Sansa grinned, “Putting on lipstick and driving motorcycles.” 

“There’s a song about you that’s pretty much all about that,” Tyrell said.

“Oh yeah? How’s it go?”

“It’s by a band called the Killers and one of the lyrics is ‘were you soldier or were you dancer.’ I think about half the college girls in the nation have that tattooed.”

“Oh, that’s awful,” Sansa laughed, secretly pleased.

“And then there’s the Beatles and their album ‘Sergeant Stark’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.’”

“Anything else I oughta know about?”

“You have no idea. We should have a movie night,” Margaery said, eyes alight. “We’ll marathon all the movies that have been made about you and the rest of the Starks. There’s a couple that are true jewels.”

“Oh yeah? They all got me in a tutu and battin’ my eyelashes at some joe in the audience?”

“A lot of them do, but not all. There’s one that won a lot of awards and is praised as being one of the best war movies ever made. Of course, then there’s that awful 80s movie, god, what’s it called, Justice Punch? Yeah, and then the second one is “Justice Punch 2: Fists of Freedom.” They’ve got this bottle-job red-head in a green spandex dress popping bubble gum and shooting machine guns. She even has this dance number in a little gold negligee that ends with her shooting a guy in the sac,” Margaery laughed and it tugged one out of Sansa too.

“See, now at least that’s familiar,” Sansa grinned. 

“What, the machine guns or destroying a man’s balls?” Margaery asked, clearly amused.

“Nah, dancin’ in a negligee,” Sansa answered as they crossed the street.

“No, no way. I will accept an America’s Darling that jumps turnstiles and skimps on bus fares, but one that did strip teases? That’s where I draw the line.”

“I didn’t strip down or nothin’, just did a couple a' blue pictures and worked the chorus line at the Aladdin on Thursday nights,” Sansa said, not bothering to think about the winter in ’38 when Ma had gotten real sick and Sansa had been tempted, just because doctors cost a lot of money and she knew that she could. There was good money in burlesque.

“What’d you do for the rest of the time?”

“Ballet, obviously,” Sansa snorted before shaking her head. “I worked days at a diner on Ocean Parkway and then worked most nights as a taxi dancer at a hall down on Flatbush.”

“I don’t even know what that is,” and Margaery pulled her into another shop and Sansa breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that jeans cost $30. It still seemed like an obscene amount but she’d been briefed on inflation.

Walking towards a rack of blouses, Sansa started sifting through them. “Taxi halls are just like regular dance halls ‘cept joes buy tickets at the door and give ‘em to the girls they wanna dance with. End of the night, you turn in the tickets you got and the manager pays you,” seeing Margaery’s wide eyes, Sansa shrugged. “It wasn’t the most respectable job but it sure beat working 12 hour days at the cigar factory. And I made ‘bout three times as much a night. It was a good gig. I was lucky to have it.”

Margaery held out a pink blouse out Sansa and she shook her head; that shade would be awful: “So you danced with men for money?”

Sansa wanted to sigh- she’d been having this same conversation for years now: “It wasn’t like I was trickin’ out or anything. It was just dancing. Some fellas had a hard time getting a girl to dance with ‘em and they got lonely. So they’d come to Red’s and they’d get a partner.”  

“Did you tell my grandfather any of this?” Margaery asked while handing a soft blue top at Sansa.

“He knew enough,” Sansa answered, remembering how his eyes had tightened and his lips thinned when she told him. He’d never mentioned it again but Sansa had known that he disapproved.

“He never told me about it. He never told anyone, not in any of the interviews. And none of your brothers talked about it either, they all just said that you were a dancer. I suppose that’s why Grandfather said you did ballet” Margaery said, frowning at lavender dress before holding it up for Sansa’s consideration. 

She shook her head, not liking pattern. "Willas never really understood about my dancing. He knew that I loved it but he’d never seen it for the job that it was. And to my siblings that’s all Red’s had ever been- a job. I’d a’ dropped it in a heartbeat if I found something that paid better.” Sansa turned and picked up a moss green lace top. It was the same shade that her jacket had been in the war and it made Sansa smile. She put it on her pile.

“That’ll be a great shade on you,” Margaery said with something like satisfaction. “I normally would have picked pastels but the fall colors seem a bit more fitting.” With the statement, the agent took back two of the shirts out of the options she’d given Sansa. Picking up the conversation, Margaery commented, “The Tyrells don’t really understand jobs. Most of us have never worked one. Old money and all that.” She said it with a smile but there was something almost predatory in her eyes.

Sansa nodded, remembering how soft Willas’ hands had been; the only callouses the result of holding a pen. She’d liked that about him though. Most of the men in her neighborhood had been dock workers or in construction. Willas’ lean body was so different from the burly ones she’d been used to. He’d been so smooth. It’d never occurred to her that she was the one who was rough and jagged.

“Alright, go try those on. I’ll look for shoes while you do.” Margaery said, abruptly ending the conversation and nudging Sansa towards the fitting rooms. She didn’t feel like now was the right time to tell Margaery that this would be the third time in her life she’d actually tried on clothes in a store. Almost every time she’d been in a clothing shop it was to see how new styles were being constructed. Then it was off to the fabric shop and home to the Singer machine in her and Arya’s apartment. After all the bills and helping out her parents and siblings, spending money on clothes had seemed not just silly- it’d been wasteful.

**

It was a dreary day, some gray clouds spilling in between the sunny days of May, and Sansa walked out of SHIELD HQ in her brown bomber jacket, boots and new jeans. She had the sunglasses she’d found in Central Park in her pocket, and had stuffed a pair of shorts in the purse Tyrell insisted she buy. She picked up three agents  on her way to the subway-Agent Donahue was one of them.

The subway jostled and Sansa moved with it. She slipped her phone into the coat pocket of the woman next to her. She wasn’t sure that there was a tracer in it somewhere but she wasn’t going to risk it.

One agent -she thought his name might be Flowers- was in the subway car with her, pretending to scroll through his phone. Agent Donahue was in the next car over. The third had stayed at the station.

She took the green line to East Harlem and when she got off only Agent Donahue came with her. Sansa, knowing she had maybe five minutes before two more agents started trailing her, walked casually down the streets, taking the two lefts and a right that she’d memorized at the library and when Agent Donahue turned around for a moment, Sansa slipped into a shop named "Cupid’s Adult Store and Bakery."

Agent Donahue passed by the store without even a glance.

**

She’d meant to be methodical when trying on the clothes but her eyes got caught on her body the same way that they always did after the serum. Four years and she still had trouble recognizing herself. Sansa had been soft before the serum, all rounded curves and smooth edges. Lean, of course, and probably too thin because of how she and Arya had to stretch meals. But she’d been soft; Sansa had liked that about herself, had known that her dance partners liked it too. It’d kept her job, if it did nothing else.

The serum had made her hard. It’d taken the soft right out of her and ripened her for war. Looking in the full-length mirror, dressed down to her skivvies so she could try on a dress, Sansa ran her fingers over her abdomen and the ridges of her muscles. The lighting in the dressing room was bright and unforgiving, putting her in harsh relief. She tapped one of her scars; a long, rigid line that stretched down her ribs. Of course the body was hard; it had to be. It was a weapon. The Little Bird had been created to do the impossible and she was made to endure.

The muscles of her back flexed when Sansa turned to pick up a dress. They rippled under her skin and she was sharp all over. Her fingers twitched and Sansa wondered what that soft, smooth girl would think of this hard body, forged for war, and would that girl even recognize, would she even respect, could she even understand-

Sansa slid the dress over her body. 

**

Sansa pretended to browse through the adult store and felt the blush creep up on her. There were some posters of ladies up on the wall in poses that were all too familiar to Sansa, even if the clothes had changed.

Moving past the display in front of her -and what was a Thrusting Jack Rabbit anyway- she approached the woman at the register and asked if there was a room she could use.

The woman tapped a sign that read "back room for paying customers only."

Glancing around, Sansa grabbed the first item she saw; a roll of condoms. She tossed it in the counter and it was only when the woman rang it up that Sansa noticed the design and immediately blushed. The condom wrappers had Captain America's shield on it and a line from one of the propaganda reels they'd made: "each bond you buy is a bullet in the barrel of your best guy's gun." It'd been one of Sansa’s lines. 

"$15.99," the woman said, completely bored.

Sansa handed over the cash and then the cashier slid a key across the counter and told her, "back of the stoor, to the left."

Sansa thanked her and rushed into the back room, knowing she was testing her time window. Locking the door behind her, Sansa quickly put on the shorts, tied her hair up in the sloppy bun she'd seen other girls wearing, put in the headphones and tucked the loose end into the pocket of her jacket. When Sansa left the store, combat boots clunking against the sidewalk, she slouched her shoulders, swaggered her hips and looked just enough like someone else to look like nobody.

**

After hanging the excess clothing on the designated rack, she made her way to the back of the shop where Margaery was waiting by the shoes. The agent had lined up five different pairs and Sansa immediately dismissed the three pairs of stilettos but agreed to a pair of ballet flats and a pair of pumps that Sansa instantly fell in love with. They were a deep maroon and had ribbon lacings and Sansa wanted to dance in them more than anything. She knew that she had no practical reason to own the pumps and the frugal part of her insisted that she leave them but, Sansa reasoned, it’s not like they were $300 pants.

As she walked back and forth in them, a pair of brown boots caught her eye. They were short, probably only came up mid-calf but they looked eerily similar to the ones that Sansa had worn in the war. She walked over to them and picked one up gently with the absurd feeling that if she didn’t the boots might disappear.

“Combat boots are making a comeback, Cap.” Margaery said, coming up to stand beside Sansa. “You can get shoes like that everywhere now.”

“I want them,” Sansa said, already turning to find a saleswoman so she could get her size.

“Are you sure? They’re almost $100.” That pulled Sansa up short. She hadn’t even bothered with the price tag. “We can find ones like it somewhere else that are cheaper. We can try a vintage shop. They might have some old combat boots.”

The thought made Sansa shake her head. She wanted something that was just hers. “No,” Sansa said, “You were right. I can afford to spend a little more on some things. These are practical anyway.”

Sansa wasn’t surprised when Margaery made her go to another four shops that day. She let herself be led through Williamsburg and Sansa had to admit that she was glad that she’d gone. The new clothes felt like a claim, a statement that she existed in this new world. And if she’d frozen in one of the dressing rooms- the style of a dress too familiar to one of her mother’s- and she’d had to brace herself on the wall and force the ice out of her, then nobody needed to know.

The only shop that made her feel out of depth was the lingerie shop. Margaery had insisted that she needed more than the plain white cotton undergarments SHIELD had given her. Sansa had gone along with it, just like she had with everything else.

“Come on,” Margaery laughed. “Don’t get old fashioned on me now. Not after everything I just found out.”

Sansa let herself be pulled into the sea of lace, muttering “Ain’t nothing different between this and the Aladdin.”

It’d been the last shop on the list and Sansa had been forced to get what she considered to be an absurd amount of underwear. Margaery had been particularly insistent about it until Sansa had snapped and told her that washing machines existed for a reason. After that, Margaery had laid off and by the time they left the store Sansa was more than ready to be done shopping.

“We should get a cab back,” Margaery said outside of the lingerie store.

Sansa reluctantly agreed. Riding a New York subway with bags took up a lot of space and nobody wanted to be that person on the train. All the same, Sansa didn’t really feel like heading back to her cage at SHIELD yet. The sun would be going down soon and Sansa really wanted to watch it from the Brooklyn Bridge. They were closer now, having made their way across a good chunk of Williamsburg and were almost in Navy Yard and then came Fulton Landing- or DUMBO, she’d learned it was called now.

“I’d like to stay here for a while,” Sansa said and almost missed the flash in Margaery’s eyes.

Understanding washed over Sansa and anger for not realizing it sooner because- “This was a field trip, wasn’t it? And the Red Thorn was my chaperone,” Sansa accused.

“It wasn’t like that,” Tyrell started to say but Sansa didn’t want to hear it.

“What were the mission parameters, Agent Tyrell? Was it just to keep an eye on me or was it intelligence gathering too? What am I allowed to do? What’s my window? I go off the grid for 10 minutes and SHIELD sends in a tac team? What are your parameters?” and the thing that got to Sansa was that she wasn’t even surprised.

“Rayder asked me to take you out. He wanted to see how you would do out in the city and I thought you needed clothes. The shopping was my idea,” Agent Tyrell insisted, like that made it all better.

Sansa felt sick; there was always another test. Pursing her lips, Sansa nodded her head. “Okay. Rayder wants to see how I do out in the city? Baby steps before granting me a monitored apartment? Let him watch. I’m walking back to HQ.” Sansa turned to walk away. Either Tyrell would follow or she’d call in some undercover agents to watch Sansa. If they weren’t already there. Sansa cursed again in her head. She hadn’t even been watching for other agents.

“Cap, wait. I’ll go with you,” Agent Tyrell said, catching up, the shopping bags brushing against her legs.

“Why?” Sansa asked, rounding on the woman.

“What?” Tyrell asked, taken aback.

“Why are you coming with me? Give me an honest answer and I’ll let you.” Sansa said, her voice hard.

That gave Agent Tyrell pause and Sansa could see that she was striving to find the right words to diffuse the situation. Sansa scoffed: “Just say it’s your job. The truth doesn’t always hurt.” She started walking again.

“Wait,” Tyrell reached out after her, clutching her arm. Her eyes looked earnest, a little desperate. Sansa held herself tall, let her body be hard. After a moment, Tyrell seemed to deflate, decision made. “Give me the bags you’re holding. I’ll get a cab and you walk back.”

Sansa nodded and then thrust the bags at the agent. “Will you go directly back?” Tyrell asked.

Sansa was about to snap at the agent, tell her it was none of her damn business, but she stopped herself. She knew that Agent Tyrell was disobeying orders right now and taking a risk on Sansa and she owed her more than a brusque dismissal and even more paperwork. “I’m going to watch the sunset. Then I’ll go back,” Sansa answered, slipping her polite mask back on. “Thank you.”

Agent Tyrell slipped on the same mask, any comradery they’d reached this afternoon undone for now: “I hope you have a nice walk. I’ll see you soon.” With that, the agent walked away. Her steps were even, confident and she walked like she could own the world. Sansa was willing to bet anything that walk was the most honest thing about her.

Sansa didn’t wait to see if Agent Tyrell got a cab, just started walking towards the Brooklyn Bridge again. Most of the streets had stayed the same, giving her a clear path to it. She walked down the sidewalks, relishing in the kind of privacy that only big cities can offer. She’d already noticed at least two agents tailing her but she forced herself to push down the disgust she was feeling. This was her first night back in Brooklyn since 1940 and she refused to let it get ruined by a paranoid government agency.

Fulton Landing- DUMBO- had changed, though not nearly as much as Navy Yard. When she had lived in DUMBO, it’d been a poor neighborhood full mostly of factory workers rubbing shoulders with hungry artists. It hadn’t been as rough as Red Hook but that wasn't much of an endorsement. Apparently DUMBO had moved up in the world. The place reeked of money; the brownstones were no longer rickety and barely meeting code and now there trees were planted by the sidewalks and some of the buildings had iron fences. The change didn’t make her as sad as she had thought it would, even if it didn’t feel at all like coming home.

She’d been walking quickly, as close to running as she wanted to get without drawing attention, and she’d managed to cut the hour long walk in half. By the time she reached the Brooklyn Bridge Promenade, the sun had already begun its descent. Hurrying just a little more, Sansa pushed past a group of tourists and walked across the bridge until she was about halfway over it. Turning to face out over the sea, Sansa leaned against the railing. The sky was already darkening over the water but Sansa only looked at it for a moment because she’d never come to the Brooklyn Bridge for the sea.

Sansa walked to the other side of the bridge, the one looking out over the city. The Manhattan Bridge stood tall across from her, cutting a clean line through the buildings. The skyline hadn’t changed as much as she’d thought. She could see it, her skyline, pressed up against the new buildings. Sansa wondered if Rickon had ever stood on this bridge and noticed the change in the skyline. He would have been a passenger in history. He would have seen the city change in a way that none of other Starks had.

Her thoughts turned to Bran. She’d read a biography on him recently and it had hurt her as much as it joyed her. The book said that he had lived in New York for a few years after the war before moving to D.C. to serve as a peace diplomat. He’d stayed there until he died in a plane crash in 1982 on his way back from Russia; he’d been trying to improve relations between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The biography had seemed to think that maybe the plane had been sabotaged.

Bran had been the one who usually accompanied Sansa when she went to the bridge just to watch the sunset. He was the only one who could sit still long enough. Arya had too much energy, Rickon thought it was a waste of time and Robb was always too busy. But Bran had sat with her to watch the sun go down. Once in a while, when she’d been out working all night, he’d met her here for the sunrise.

It was on the Brooklyn Bridge that he told her that he was queer. He’d said it like he didn’t know if it’d drown him or save him but he’d said it anyway, a quiet whisper as the sun came up. Sansa remembered smiling and asking if he had a fella and Bran had honest to god blushed. And then he told her about a boy named Johnny who liked to play cards and looked beautiful smoking a cigarette. Sansa didn’t know if she’d ever loved him more.

That same biography had told her that after the crash, it was revealed that Bran had been having an affair with Jojen Reed and that had almost made those stubborn tears fall. Her brother had met Jojen during the war. He had been a Canadian bombardier in the RAF and Bran had had the fiercest love for his soldier. They didn’t see each other often, not with how the Howling Commandos functioned, but when they did, the Starks had done everything they could to make sure they could be alone. Reading that Jojen had not only lived through the war, but that he and Bran had been able to keep loving each other, that had to be one of the best things she had heard since waking up.

Rickon had been loved and the woman he had loved was still alive and so strong. Bran had been loved and the man he had loved had become one of the leaders of the Gay Rights Movements. It made Sansa smile, the edges of her lips tugged down and her heart heavy, but the thought was comforting for all that it was painful. Her little brothers had been truly loved in the world and it was all that she had ever wanted for them.

Sansa stayed on the bridge until long after the sun had finished setting. She stayed to watch the city light up, for the air to get a faint chill, for the agents watching her to leave or risk being totally conspicuous. She stayed on the bridge and let herself remember her city for just a little while longer, knowing that once she left she’d have to finally shed the last bits of nostalgia she had. She couldn’t afford it anymore. Sansa thought about her hard body, about surviving, and found that she desperately wanted to.

**

She managed to get a seat on the subway, squished between a teenage girl with her lip pierced and a man who instantly fell asleep on her shoulder. As the car bounced and rattled, a bright strip of yellow caught her eye. Plastered on top of a movie advertisement- and Sansa wasn’t sure women were supposed to bend like that- was a sticker that read “Arya Stark didn’t die for this.”

A smile tugged at Sansa’s lips and she glanced around. There was another sticker, this one wrapped around one of the poles in the car and yet another on an ad for a law firm she’d seen over by HQ- and she almost turned to tell Arya, “See, at least someone thinks you’re right.” Except Arya- Arya. So it broke Sansa’s heart just a little that Arya couldn’t laugh and elbow her and say that “at least someone has a brain, ya scarecrow” and Sansa missed her sister down to the tips of her toes.

**

The band is playing a song that’s close to familiar, it’s so familiar, but the piano is just a little out of tune. But it’s not right and- and- a joe comes up to you, a ticket in his hand but you can’t read the name. His face swims a little and maybe he’s familiar too but his hand is warm so you put it on your waist and let him lead you around in a six count. He’s good and he flips you like you weigh nothing but his eyes keep twisting and you can’t- you can’t- another joe grabs at your arm and pulls and you slam against his chest. He looks right through you, even as he yanks you across the dance floor. He spins you out and at the last moment lets go, his ticket falling to the ground. You hit another joe and you get tossed around and up and suddenly the dance floor is frozen and the joes keep shoving their tickets at you and you’re going to make a killing tonight with all the commissions but then the joe you’re dancing with throws you up and doesn’t catch you and then there’s Willas. 

Except Willas isn’t looking at you. He’s looking straight through you, even when he gives you his ticket and takes you in his arms and you try to tell Willas that he doesn’t have to pay for a dance that that’s only for the joes and that dancin’ with him should just be for fun and then you’re in the dressing room at the Aladdin and he’s got your skirt up and he’s pressing into you from behind and you’re looking in the mirror but you don’t have a face. 

You don’t think you’ve ever had one. 

**

After checking outside Cupid’s to make sure Agent Donahue or any of the other agents hadn't made her, Sansa scaled a fire escape, ran five blocks across the rooftops, dropped down and hailed a cab. There were too many cameras in the subway.

It cost an appalling amount but Sansa had made sure she brought enough cash.

**

There was a statue of the Howling Commandos and Captain America across from the arch in the Grand Army Plaza. It loomed in the entrance of Prospect Park. Sansa frowned.

**

And there, tucked between Conover and Sullivan was the husk of a warehouse and it was almost funny how much it felt like home, preserved in a way that DUMBO wasn’t. Sansa leaned against the iron fence guarding the dock. She waited to see who would come.

**

The new yellow dressed swished against her thighs and the maroon pumps tapped against the hardwood. The brassy sounds of Benny Goodman rang loud from the gymnasium speakers. And Sansa was dancing. She was dipping and sliding and doing the six count and there was a smile on her lips. After she’d forced her body to move and shaken off the nightmare, she’d gotten up to put on her workout clothes and then she saw the dress instead and now Sansa was dancing and she felt so free she thought she might float away on the feeling. 

Her legs were flying out in all the familiar angles and she threw a flip and went down in the splits and popped up and her arms spun circles and she laughed. A heavy drum line came on and Sansa jitterbugged across the floor, flying high on the act itself. The trombones made her swing her hips and kick her feet up and she could finally breathe. 

Sandor came into the gym later, just as she knew he would. She heard him laugh and Sansa knew how she must look. She was bopping her hips to a slow swing number, some Clyde McCoy song, in the middle of a gym with a goofy smile on her face. Sansa laughed with him because it felt good to do it. His laugh lingered and it had none of its usual mirth, none of the bitterness. This is what he sounded like when was happy, Sansa realized. She liked it. The trumpet player flutter tongued and Sansa shook her hips at Sandor, imitating her days on stage, making it large and dramatic.

Still laughing, Sandor said, “Tired of breaking punching bags?”

Sansa spun, ending with her back to him. “Felt like kickin’ up my feet is all,” she looked at him over her shoulder and threw him a wink.

“I thought those dances were for partners,” he said as he pulled out a punching bag from the supply closet.

“They are, but the last good partner I had was years ago.”

“Tyrell?”

Sansa shook her head, even though he couldn’t see it: “Willas was kind and wonderful but he couldn’t dance very well, not with his leg bein’ the way it was. He tried though.”

“So who was he?” Sandor asked, coming back into view and hooking up the bag. “The last good partner?”

Sansa’s smile grew wistful with the memory. “His name was Bucky Barnes and he danced like he was born for it. He might not a’ been my best partner, but he had a passion and joy that couldn’t be beat.”

She glanced at Sandor, noticed the strange, almost soft look he had: “Did you love him?”

“No,” Sansa answered honestly. “But I think in another life I coulda. See, Bucky had a fella, Steve Rogers, and they loved each other like there was no one else in the world. The way they looked at each other you’d think the other had hung up the moon and all the stars.”

The song changed to something with more swing, and Sansa let her limbs go loose and a little bit wild. “But that was all illegal, ya know, bein’ queer. So Bucky and I pretended we were goin’ steady. That way nobody thought twice ‘bout all the time he spent with Steve. And it didn’t hurt me any. I could do all the dancing I wanted and didn’t have to worry about him making a move I didn’t want.”

Sandor hadn’t even started hitting the bag; he was just leaning against it, that same look on his face: “Why’d you do it?”

Sansa smiled again: “Because I used to be a romantic, and they had a love for the centuries.”

“What happened to them?”

Sansa shrugged, never falling out of rhythm. “The same thing that happened to everyone else; the war. Steve had a list of medical issues about a mile long so there was no way the army was gonna take him. So he and Bucky stole up to Canada to try and join the RAF,” Sansa paused and her steps faltered for a moment. “I never found out if they got in. I don’t even know if they survived the war,” she stopped dancing completely, thinking of Bran and Jojen and the recent marriage laws that had been passed in New York.

Sansa pushed the thoughts away, choosing instead to remember the way that Steve and Bucky had smiled at each other across the dance floor, how Bucky would swing her through the air and she would laugh. “I guess it doesn't really matter anymore,” she said with a sad smile. “What matters is that Bucky Barnes could dance like a dream and he loved his fella well.”

“You should teach me,” Sandor blurted out and when Sansa turned to him, she was shocked to discover that he was blushing.

Sansa stopped dancing: “You wanna learn to lindy hop?”

“Sure,” he said, squaring his jaw.

“I hadn’t pegged ya for a dancer.”

“I’m not,” Sandor responded, pulling the tape off of his hands. “But you can’t expect a man to resist legs like yours for very long.”

Sansa laughed, clear and loud. “Flatterer,” she said. “Sweet talker.”

“Only with you, девочка," he said it with a glint in his eye and a smirk on his lips.

“Well, c’mon then, stud. Let’s cut a rug,” Sansa drawled, batting her eyelashes. She stepped into his arms, put one of his hands on her lower back and took the other in her own. “Although next time we dance you better have your glad rags on.”

“Of course, милая.” She arched an eyebrow at him and his smirk only grew.

It was obvious that Sandor had never danced before. For all that he was fluid, maybe even graceful, in a fight he couldn’t seem to make his limbs follow the steps. Sansa felt his muscles tense under hands and he started to frown.

“Try it with a smile,” Sansa said, trying to make him lose the tension. “Dancing’s easier when ya smile.”

“I don’t understand how that would help,” Sandor said, his voice gruff as he stared down at his feet. His legs and feet were doing all the right things, but even he could tell that it looked awkward.

“Trust me,” Sansa said, “Smiling always makes the dancing better.” For a moment, Sansa thought that he wasn’t going to do it, that his constant frown would stay in place. Then a weak, hesitant, absolutely forced smile wormed its way onto his face.

Sansa couldn’t help it, she laughed. “It’s dancin’, Sandor, not torture.”

“Could have fooled me,” the large man grumbled.

“You didn’t have to ask, ya know. Coulda just let me do it alone.”

Sandor met her eyes then, surprisingly fierce: “You needed a new partner.”

Sansa could feel the sentiment behind the statement, its honesty. She let it settle between them and kept her voice teasing. “You’re never gonna get there if you don’t smile, stud." 

Just as she knew it would, the petname brought his smirk back and that was something Sansa could work with. “That wasn’t so hard was it?” She asked and was delighted when he actually smiled. 

Dancing with Sandor, Sansa realized how long it’d been since someone had touched her and it wasn’t a fight. His hand in hers, the weight of his arms around his waist, settled something inside of her. Sansa thought it might have been peace.

After they’d called it quits for the night, Sansa asked him if he wanted to learn more, trying not to let the hope show in her face. Sandor’s eyes met hers, utterly sincere, and he said, “милая, for you I would learn to waltz.”

“Oh, believe me, Sandor,” she said, putting her hand on his arm. “That would be torture.” When he laughed, Sansa got the urge to kiss him on the cheek so she did, and when his look of surprise melted into a smile, Sansa realized that it’d been a long time since she’d done anything so soft.

**

The water was choppy and the wind was blowing but Sansa was sure that she wouldn’t have heard him coming even if it had been completely silent. She didn’t know he was there until the hairs on the back of her neck pricked up and for the first time since meeting him, Sansa felt his size. He loomed over her and it was suffocating. Her fingers clenched around the iron fence she was leaning against, felt the metal bend under her grip.

Betrayal sat bitter at the back of her throat.

“I’d hoped it wouldn’t be you,” she said, and it came out hard, just like everything else about her. 

“I had hoped you would not run,” Sandor said and he sounded resigned.

“So this is why they call you the Hound?” Sansa let the bitterness cover up the hurt. “You know, when Shireen said that you were the best at what you did but what you did wasn’t very nice I didn’t expect you to turn out to be a glorified delivery boy.”  

Sandor turned to her and his gray eyes pierced right through her.  

“You here to take me back to Rayder? Gonna wrap me up in a bow?” she asked, gripping the metal tighter.  

“да,” he answered, quiet, and Sansa wanted to knock his lights out. It wasn’t supposed to be him, anyone but him.  

“So all those nights in the gym, they were-”  

“Sansa-”   

“A job! A, a, a mission!” Sansa’s voice broke around the word and the metal snapped in her fist.  

“No," Sandor hissed, grabbing her shoulders and wrenching her around to look at him. Sansa let herself go, the metal shiv clutched tight. “No, that wasn’t the job. Those nights are ours-”  

Sansa pulled out of his grip.“Nothing is mine!” she cried, and the metal sliced her hand.  

Sandor reached for her again and time slowed because this went two ways. Sansa could drop the shiv, go back to the white room and let Rayder put her on a leash. Or she drove the shiv into Sandor’s gut and she could run and leave him bleeding on a sidewalk in Red Hook.   

If it’d been Tyrell, Bronn-maybe even Shireen- but it was Sandor. Sansa dropped the shiv and let herself slump into his arms and god but the tears wouldn’t fall. 

“милая, you have me. I swear you have me-” the words came out desperate against her ear.

And it was too much, the words too sweet and Sansa shoved him. “I don’t know you,” she

shouted. “How can I have you when I don’t know the first thing about you? Tell me who you are!”   

Sandor stiffened, his eyes going suddenly empty, dead. “Name: Alexander Ivanovich Clegane. Codename: the Hound. Born in 1948. Trained from childhood by the House of Black and White."  

“Stop! This isn’t how I want to know!” Sansa cried, shoving at Sandor again, wanting to stop the emptiness in his eyes because-   

“Loaned to the KGB for the glory of Soviet supremacy. Loaned to-”  

“Stop, please-” because she knew what this was, remembered-  

“Midas and the Bloody Mummers. Escaped the House of Black and White in 1998-”  

Sansa clapped her hand over his mouth. “Sandor, please, I want to know you. Not this-,” she remembered being unmade.   

He stopped talking suddenly and then he shuddered, blinked. Sandor’s eyes met hers and Sansa almost whimpered at the life she saw in. 

Sansa lowered her hand.

She watched him come back to himself, watched the rage seep in.  

“You once said you were trying to break out of your programming-” Sansa started, quiet, understanding.  

His eyes dug into her.  

“And direct orders-” he nodded curtly before a harsh laugh burst out of him and his hand curled around the knife at his hip; he gripped it like a talisman.  

“I’m sorry,” Sansa whispered. “I didn’t realize-”  

“It’s been years-," and Sansa recoiled at the venom in his voice.“Years since that’s happened and then you- fuck you, сука. It’s been years and then you," he turned from her, spitting out the words. "You rip me up.”  

“I don’t mean to. I swear I don’t-” but she’d become so hard.  

“Why did you run? Why couldn’t you have just stayed there?” he hissed, launching himself into her space, crowding her.  

“I wasn’t running away,” Sansa admitted quietly. “I just wanted to see how long the leash was.”  

The tension didn’t leak out of his body at the admission and his hand stayed gripped on the knife but Sansa could see him wrangle himself for the conversation. It was a bitter taste, knowing she’d put that tension there. 

He surprised her then, pushing his rage down and trying so damned hard to fight everything that he’d been made into: “The clothes were a good choice- you look like everyone else. And the sex shop-”  

“Nobody expects America’s Darling to turn up in one of those,” Sansa said, her tone sardonic, letting him turn the conversation, letting him escape. 

“да. Donahue was blushing all through the report,” and Sansa didn’t mean to, but she resented the amusement in his voice. This was her life and he was keeping her in the cage.  

"I wish you hadn’t run,” Sandor said, his voice heavy. Sansa glanced at him. “I didn’t want to have to bring you back. Not if you didn’t want to go.”  

“Sandor,” she said, trying to make him look at her. “Sandor,” she repeated and then his eyes slowly slid to hers. “I don’t have anywhere to run. This,” Sansa swept her arms out, bringing in the broken brick street, the hollow warehouses and graffiti, “Brooklyn’s all I have. There’s nothing else left.”   

Sandor searched her face and she let her honesty show; let the pain scratch itself across her face.

“I hope there is enough," Sandor said and he understood so much better than Sansa could have hoped.

Sansa drooped against the fence, let her shoulder rub against his. “It’s a whole new world,” Sansa admitted, “but Brooklyn’s got old bones. Always has.” Sansa pointed at the old brick warehouse across from them. “I used to work there. After I dropped out of school, I spent five years rolling cigars before getting a job at Red’s Dance Hall. And Robb,” Sansa twisted out to look at the pier, “worked over on the docks. Which, by the way, what’s an IKEA?” Sansa asked, looking at the monstrosity near them.

Sandor actually laughed, “It’s hell with Swedish furniture.” 

“I thought it might be another factory,” Sansa shrugged, not really sure what he meant but willing to let it go because it’d made him laugh and that was all she wanted. “Red Hook always liked its factories. Not as much as an alley fight, but it liked ‘em all the same.” 

“Never pictured you in an alley fight, милая.” 

“Probably because I never got in one. Now, Arya,” Sansa smiled sadly at the memory, “Arya got into alley fights. Rickon, too.” 

“That never stopped,” Sandor said, his lips quirking up. 

“Yeah?”

“He used to go out patrolling the city at night and stop crime like some sort of vigilante. Pissed Rayder off but Rickon didn’t give a damn.”

Sansa grinned. That was her baby brother all over.

“I used to go with him sometimes when we were in the same city at the same time,” Sandor paused, steeled himself, offered up a truth. “He found me in an alley in Mumbai, covered in shit and blood and ready to kill anyone for anything.” He leveled Sansa with a look. “I have never been a good person.”

Sansa held his gaze. She thought about Private Rodriguez and the scars on her arms- and the prisoners, always the prisoners and the bloody knife in her hand. She thought about the way that the shadows felt like home. She nodded. “I think I used to be,” and it was achingly satisfying that he didn’t try to contradict her. 

“I’m not going to run away, Sandor,” she said and he breathed deep. “I’m a Stark and that means my home is Brooklyn. I won’t leave.” Sansa looked back out over the choppy waves, at the docks where her brothers had worked all their lives and there were ghosts, but god, those ghosts were hers.

**

The uniform fit well and it would be easy to fight in. Light, mobile, and it looked good on her. Sansa traced one of the white stripes down from the top of her breast to where it met her red boots at her knees. She splayed her hand across the star on her chest and then dabbed at the corner of her eye where her make-up had smudged. Sansa breathed and shook her hair so that that it spilled gently across her shoulders. The cowl framed her eyes and two large wings stretched out behind her ears. Sansa breathed and looked at America’s Darling in her red lipstick. Sansa breathed and hefted up the shield. Captain America.

“Let’s give ‘em a show,” Sansa muttered and walked out the door.    

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Issue! Captain America fights the forces of Evil! 
> 
> The story I mentioned about Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes was actually inspired by this great fic written by Odsbodkins in the stucky fandom called "Red, white and blue; what does it mean to you." Here's a link in case you're curious: http://archiveofourown.org/works/1527035
> 
> And lastly, this image is what I've imaged Sansa's Cap uniform to be like. It's a piece of fanart done by seizure7 of America Chavez (one of my favorite superheroes).  
> 
> 
> Here's a close-up because I love the wings stretching back and think it's a nice throwback to Sansa's war name: the Little Bird.  
> 


	5. Maybe I wasn't Born to Die

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She'll try harder. She's already trying hard. She'll try harder.

 

Sansa was standing at a podium looking out over a sea of heads with cameras poised and notebooks ready. It wasn’t, all things considered, very different from the dog and pony show she’d done as the Little Bird. They’d put her in green and tight skirts back then for those shows though. She’d always felt like an imposter but this-

Her Captain America uniform was meant for durability, for heavy impact, for protection and it weighed heavy on her shoulders as she faced the journalists down. It felt wrong, it all felt wrong but this especially-

“Good evening,” she began and wished that they’d let her keep the cowl up. “My name is Sansa Stark and I’m Captain America.”

**

New York Times

SANSA STARK FOUND ALIVE

May 25, J. Jones

NYC: Last night, the nation over was shocked by the news that Sansa Stark, hero of the second World War, darling of America, and seemingly lost to history, has been found. For decades, scientists and adventurers have explored the Arctic Sea in search of the missing soldier only for the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division (SHIELD)- to have found her in early May. Frozen in ice for 67 years, the

**

Solid weight of the shield on one arm. The comfort of a knife in her hand.

**

Huffington Post

FRAUD OR FOSSIL

June 1, Betty Brant

In a world of Elvis sightings, kids in hot air balloons and bat babies, would it be so outrageous that this Sansa Stark resurrection is nothing but another media fraud?

**

Fury slid a folder across the desk to her. “Assemble a STRIKE team. These are the available operatives.”

She opened the file. She’d never had a team, just a family.

**

Sansa threw the shield.

**

People Magazine

EVEN SUPERSOLDIERS NEED TO JOG!

June 3, Everheart

Sansa Stark was seen running through her hometown, Manhattan, wearing a purple sports bra and black yoga pants. Talk about abs!

**

The bank robber fired and the bullet connected. The uniform took the brunt of the impact but it still lodged itself between her ribs and they cracked.

Her knife met the joint of his arm.

**

Time Magazine

SANSA STARK: MIRACLE OF THE CENTURY

June 7, Reed.

In this era of modern science, it is sometimes difficult to remember to be incredulous. The discovery of Sansa Stark, and the science used to thaw

**

Cosmo

AMERICA’S DARLING: 95 AND LOOKING FLY

**

Sansa threw the-

**

Her hand pressed firm against the mercenary’s straining neck.

**

Mensrights.com

SANSA STARK: RUINING THE MILITARY SINCE 1941

**

The White Walkers dunk you in the tank again again again again again again-

Sansa slept through the night.

She wished she hadn’t.

**

She threw-

**

The Daily Bugle

CAPTAIN AMERINOT

**

Arya comes at you- Rickon rushes you- you can’t find Bran and Robb just watches. He always just-

**

Threw the-

**

Washington Post

THE RETURN OF AMERICA’S DARLING AND AMERICA’S MORALITY

**

Threw-

**

Ice sticking up and through the scars on your arms-

**

Buzzfeed.com

25 REASONS WHY SANSA STARK AS CAPTAIN AMERICA IS GREAT FOR FEMINISM

**

Threw the-

**

She threw-

**

“Excuse me,” Sansa called out, drawing the attention of a woman fixing a window screen. "I'm looking for Mya Stone. She owns the building?"

The woman stepped down the short ladder and wiped her hands on her jeans: "Yeah, that's me. What can I do for you?"

"A woman down at that Ethiopian market- Maharene- she said you had a room for rent. I was hoping to take a look at it."

The woman frowned: "Yeah, I know her but I don’t usually rent to folks from outside the neighborhood."

Sansa stretched a smile across her face. "'Course, yeah. Sorry I bothered you." She shifted her grip on the big duffle bag and turned to leave. She tried not to let the disappointment show. She'd been excited to find the brownstone rowhouse, had liked the familiarity of Bed-Stuy even if she'd never lived there.

But she wasn't going back to that white room. It wouldn't be the first time she’d slept on the street.

"You a vet?" The woman asked and Sansa had to breathe deep. "You've got the look." Slowly, tightening her grip on the large tote that held her shield, she turned back. "It's not obvious. But it's there if you know what you're looking for."

"You?" Sansa asked.

Mya Stone nodded. "Two tours and three years back with a metal leg as thanks for it."

Mya had an easy smile, big, like she did it often. Sansa’s throat went tight. "A month."

She whistled: "Fresh off the boat, huh?” After a moment, Mya nodded, seeming to decide something: “Alright, I wouldn’t normally do this but why don’t you come up, look at the unit. You like it, it’s yours.”

Sansa stayed quiet even as she felt herself stiffen, her eyes narrow.

“It’s not pity,” Mya said, her voice just a little bit hard. “I know what it’s like to have no place to go.”

Sansa nodded: “Thank you.”

“You got a name?”

“Sansa Stark,” and she waited for Mya to go starry-eyed and tongue-tied. She didn’t. Relief spread over her like a wave.

**

The first time Sansa felt well and truly cold in the 21st Century was on June 17, 2012 when SHIELD sent her on a mission to North Dakota and there was a surprise blizzard.

Sansa was grateful, she was  so grateful that the blizzard didn’t hit until she and Red Thorn were already escorting the hostages into the medical tents that SHIELD had set up because the air was already chilled but when the snow came, it came hard with a sharp wind that stabbed right through her and Sansa’s breath came short and her eyes widened and it took everything she had not to scream and curl up and drown in it. But she didn’t because there wasn’t the time for her to be weak, so Sansa steeled herself and let herself go numb with it until she could continue giving orders to the rescued hostages, until she’d seen that they were safe and until everything was squared away and she could squirrel herself away in the dark corner of an ally of and then-

Sansa’s fingers fisted her hair, her knees curled up to her chest, her head down and Sansa’s breath went quick and loud-

Sansa walked out of the alley two minutes later and nobody noticed a damn thing.

**

Rayder’s office was just as stale as the first time she’d seen it. There were the big tall windows that the future loved so much and plush black leather couches, an enormous glass desk. The man himself sat behind it, back rigid, fingers folded and staring at her grimly. Sansa supposed that it could be an intimidating look but if he wanted her cowed, he’d have to do better.

“I’d like to know why you thought it would be a good idea to try and run away,” he started. “You haven’t been properly introduced-”

“It wasn’t an attempt, sir,” Sansa interrupted, pettily satisfied when Rayder looked offended. “If I wanted out, I wouldn’t be here.”

“Elaborate.”

Sansa cocked her head off to the side, considering. She wanted to make sure that Rayder understood the limit of his power. “It took me five minutes to lose three of your agents. It took you five hours to track me down,” Sansa levelled her gaze, “and you found me waiting. Imagine if I actually tried to get away.”

Rayder’s nostrils flared. “SHIELD houses some of the best operatives in the world, Captain. We’d find you anywhere you went.”

She smiled sharp: “The world’s a big place.” Sansa pulled out the chair across from the director and sat down, crossing her ankles. “But I don’t it want to come to that, so let’s talk.”

After a moment, Rayder nodded and sat back in his seat. “Alright, Cap. Let’s talk. What do you want?”

“I pick an apartment of my choice. I pay for it, it’s under my name. And no more tails. Not a single agent-” Rayder opened his mouth- “That’s non-negotiable. I find a single agent following me and I’ll disappear. No more Captain America. No more symbol.”

“It’s for your own protection. The agents are there to make sure nothing happens to you. It’s a brand new world and we want to make sure you can get along in it,” Rayder tried to placate her. 

Her fist clenched and she resisted the urge to scold him like the liar he was: “No more agents.”

Rayder shook his head: “SHIELD has regulations. I can’t just let you go galavanting across the country. If you work for SHIELD, you follow SHIELD regs.”

“So give me a handler,” Sansa argued.

“SHIELD does have liaisons-” Sansa’s jaw clenched at his unwillingness to call it what it was, “that work to communicate with some of our more specialized operatives.”

“Good, then give me that.” It wasn’t ideal but if it was one person- Sansa could work with that.

“We’ll start with daily check-ins-”

“Weekly-”

“Daily- don’t push it, Captain,” Rayder warned and Sansa let him have it. “And I want you to do a press conference.”

Sansa nodded. She may have hated the idea but it was a long time coming. Symbols didn’t work if you kept them hidden.

**

Open floor. Five exits. Three possible sniper’s nest. Unoccupied. Seven targets. Orders to subdue.

The shield rebounded off a man’s ribs. Six. She caught it, brought it down on the knee of another, uppercut to the chin. Five. She brought the back of her ankle to a man’s neck, dragging him down, rolling up, shield to the spine. Four. Caught a knife, threw it back, side of the throat. Three.  Side kick, block, flanked, ducked, threw the shield against the warehouse wall; it hit the mercenary behind her, two, kick to the man’s knee, it broke, one, caught the shield, gripped the man’s neck, slammed him against the floor. “Clear,” Sansa breathed into the comm.

A woman in tactical gear broke out of the shadows, dashing for the far door. “Target sighted. In pursuit.” Sansa took off after her, leapt off the wall, vaulted the railing. The target turned, bringing up a gun. The bullet deflected off the shield. She threw it and knocked the gun out of the target's hand, breaking the wrist. The shield hit the wall, hit her neck. She crumpled. “Target secure,” Sansa said and bound the woman’s hands in a zip tie.

“Acknowledged. Evac in five. Bring target to roof.”

“Affirmative.”

Sansa flipped the shield up from the floor and caught it on her arm in the smooth motion she’d practised. The edge of it was covered in blood. A drop fell to the floor.

Sansa swung it over her back, hooking it to the custom magnet on the back of her harness.

Robb had never gotten it bloodstained.

She would do better.

**

“So,” Mya started, taking the steps sideways and slow, “A month? You SNAFU or FUBAR?”

“FUBAR,” Sansa choked out around a shaky laugh, glad to say it. “Like the day is long." 

Mya’s smirk was knowing and a little bit sad: “Ain’t we all.”

**

The heat of the desert sun made her  the warmest she’d ever been. But the stench of the bodies they found, desecrated and burnt on the border- that lingered much, much longer.

**

“Do you want to talk about why you ran from SHIELD?” Dr. Lewin asked, his voice gentle like it always was.

“Not really,” Sansa replied. Her eyes met his and she made sure that her expression was blank. SHIELD hadn’t earned anything from her and for all his kindness, neither had Dr. Lewin.

The doctor sighed, the first time she had heard him do it, and slumped a little in his office chair: “I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me, Captain.”

Sansa slipped on a polite smile: “I’ll try harder.”

His eyes went a little hard then and Sansa finally understood why he worked for SHIELD. "I want you to know that I recommended that you not be cleared for active duty."

"But Rayder wanted his weapon."

"Is that how you see yourself? A weapon?"

"You don’t?"

His lips thinned. "I think you're a highly traumatized war veteran suffering from anxiety, paranoia and depression. I think you're experiencing a completely unprecedented sense of displacement and are undoubtedly in extreme grief over the loss of your family," Dr. Lewin paused and Sansa, terrified, kept her face blank. "I also think you're one of the strongest people I've ever met because despite all of that, you are enduring. I think you will continue to endure." He leaned forward. “But you won’t- not if you keep doing what you’re doing. All the fighting- all the lying- it’ll drag you down. You know that. So don’t let it.”

“I- I’ll-” Sansa pushed the words out against her closing throat. “I’ll try harder.”

**

The shield hissed through the air, rebounded off the crack of a collarbone-

**

The apartment was small, a little dark, but with a big window in the main room, a kitchen big enough to breathe in and the one bedroom looked out over the street and had a little balcony. It was all white.

“Can I paint the walls,” Sansa asked, interrupting Mya’s schpiel about the heating. 

After a moment, Mya said, “So long as you paint ‘em back when you move out.”

Sansa smiled, a small little thing, but genuine, “I’ll take it.” She turned to Mya and she felt excited, the sensation breaking through the gray haze she’d been living in. “Can I move in today?”

Mya looked calculating again and a twinge of doubt shot through Sansa. “That’s all you have, isn’t it?” Mya said, gesturing at the duffle bag and tote that Sansa was carrying.

She nodded.

With a sigh, Mya ran a hand across her shaved head. “You can move in today on two conditions: you let my fiancée feed you dinner and you borrow a sleeping bag and some pillows until you get a bed.” Mya’s eyes were flint and serious: “You’ve earned a helluva lot more than sleepin’ on hardwood with an empty stomach.”

Sansa swallowed, a little overwhelmed. “Yeah, yeah sure. Twist my arm.”

**

“Name’s Agent Tarly,” the man stuck out his hand. It was warm and a little bit sticky from sweat but he had an honest smile. At least, Sansa supposed, as honest a smile as a SHIELD liaison could have.

**

Mya paused for a moment in front of a door on the first floor landing. For the first time, she looked uncomfortable. “Look, uh, I just wanna warn you: my fiancée’s a real big fan.”

Sansa shook her head: “I was starting to think that you hadn’t noticed.”

With a smirk, Mya unlocked the door: “I’m crippled, not blind.”

**

“Ask me a question,” and Sansa almost decked him for sneaking up on her and he really ought to know better.

“What?” Sansa panted, getting her balance back and refusing to slow her run. She had ten miles left and had finally started to feel winded. It’d been good, pushing her body this far, getting out of her head. Clegane kept pace with her and when Sansa glanced at him, she noticed that he hadn’t even started sweating yet. “Were you waiting for me?” she asked.

His shoulders twitched up: “I know your running path.” Sansa gritted her teeth. She’d found this path three days ago on a blog called brooklynrunner and it was a good one; she could get about 20 miles out of it. It went around the southern tip of Manhattan, past Governor’s Island and she could loop around into Brooklyn over the bridge. She hoped she wouldn’t have to find a new one.

“Ask me a question,” Clegane repeated.

“No.”

“Ask me,” Clegane almost growled, his frustration bubbling up.

“Look, Clegane-”

His arm shot out to grab her but Sansa dodged it. He was easy to read when he was angry. “My name-” he gritted. “Say my name.”

She watched him again as he ran next to her and she didn’t let herself feel how nice it was to have him by her side again. Sansa pushed back against the comfort of him. But he looked- hurt, so- “Alright. Sandor. But you don’t owe me anything, especially not something like this.”

“Ask me!” he seethed.

“No-”

“Please,” and it came out desperate.

Sansa veered off of the path, stopping next to a tree and leaning against it. Sandor stood in front of her and for all that he was a giant, he seemed, in this moment, almost small. Vulnerable.

“Fine,” Sansa said and his relief was almost palpable. “But you have to ask me one after.” He started to shake his head but Sansa cut him off. “That’s the deal. A question for a question or this doesn’t happen.”

Emotions flickered across his face too fast for her to read before finally settling on the steely determination that she was used to: “Ask me.”

Sansa paused because- this was his trust but- and it would be so easy to hurt him like this, to sink her talons in and leave him bloody- she could ask him anything and god save him but he would answer and Sansa had become many things but cruel still wasn’t one of them.

“You said you were born in 1948,” his jaw stiffened and Sansa almost stopped because maybe this question was too- but then he nodded and Sansa went on. “But you- you can’t be that old. You don’t even look 40. Sandor, do you age?” Sansa asked, suddenly terrified of the answer.

“Yes,” he answered, automatic. “But slowly.” Sansa didn’t know if she was allowed to ask how, if that would be two questions but then he offered her so much more than she deserved. “I was given my version of the supersoldier serum when I was 17,” he stared at her hard. “What use is a weapon if it weakens with age?”

Sansa did the math: “You’ve aged maybe, what? 20 years in almost 70? Is that-” as awful as it sounds she wanted to ask but stopped. One question. “Your turn.”

“That’s it?” Sandor asked, surprised. She didn’t know if it was because she’d taken less than she could or because he’d expected it to be worse.

“Yeah, that’s it. Now ask me.”

Sandor started to shake his head: “That was the deal, Sandor. A question for a question." 

“I know,” he snapped. “Just- let me think.” Sandor turned from her then, getting back on the path and starting to run. After a moment, Sansa caught up to him. She started to be lulled into that sense of security that he brought with him and she resented him for it. He’d gotten what he wanted from her, some sense of redemption or- and it still left Sansa cold.

They ran for a while, side by side and silent in their familiar way until she felt him stiffen beside her. He’d thought of the question but it took him longer to ask it. Some things, Sansa knew, took time to say. Sandor, when he did finally turn to her, had a heavy gaze, a cutting one: “Would you go back?”

“Is that your question?” Sansa clarified, praying that he’d say no so she could run from it. No one had asked her that yet.

“That’s my question.”

It would be easy, she supposed, it would be so easy to say “yes” and leave it at that; to wrap up all of the longing inside of her into such a simple word. Going back was working three jobs to make sure that her family stayed stitched tight and knowing all the songs on the radio and hanging laundry between fire escapes and dragging her bones across Europe. But none of that was what she wanted. She longed desperately to see her family again and lay to rest all the demons inside of her that the war planted deep and to sleep sweet and to feel loved and she wanted to go home. And that had nothing at all to do with going back.

“No,” Sansa forced herself to say for all that she hated the answer.

“Why not?”

“Because it wouldn’t change anything.”

**

Target in sight, Sansa breathed out and squeezed the trigger. She did it again, the kickback jolting but never enough to throw her back. Smoothly, Sansa pulled the bolt and ejected the casing- a habit that had become ingrained with her Springfield back in the war. She’d never been as good with it as Bran but none of them were. It was why he’d been the Crow.

Then again, that Springfield had nothing on the Barrett MRAD. The design was solid, kickback minimal and Sansa liked the weight of it. She’d chosen it today because of the bolt-action and the focus she’d need. It was methodical; trigger, bolt, adjust, trigger. Again and again. The bullets ripped through walls and Sansa could imagine the exit wound it would leave, how easily it would leave them; how efficiently.

Sansa noticed Shireen approach her. She’d kept her movements large and obvious, letting Sansa know she was coming. Sansa pulled the trigger again, release, trigger. Shireen waited until Sansa emptied the magazine before crouching down beside her and pulling off her hearing protection.

After making it clear that she wasn’t going away anytime soon, Sansa pulled off her own hearing protection and put the safety on. Without looking at the agent, Sansa sat up to grab another magazine.

Shireen sighed and Sansa felt her exasperation. Sansa knew she was being petty and that Shireen didn’t deserve the cold shoulder but it stung all over, remembering that she was SHIELD and Sansa didn’t trust anything to do with SHIELD.

“Rayder is pissed,” Shireen stated like she was saying the sun was out. Sansa nodded, settling back into position. “He doesn’t understand why you would try to leave.” Shireen paused. Sansa nodded again and was about to put the hearing protectors back on when she spoke again. “I don’t either. SHIELD is the good guys. Always has been. Your brothers- Rickon designed it to be that way. He would have been proud to have you serving. Hell, he was proud to serve. He did it all his life-”

“A park ranger,” Sansa said, her voice calmer than she thought it would be.

“What?” Shireen asked, her eyes wide and startled that Sansa had spoken.

“That’s what Rickon said he wanted to be after the war.”

After a moment: “I didn’t know.” It came out pained.

Sansa finally turned to face the agent crouched beside her. “Rickon wanted things to be quiet. He didn’t want- he never- the Rickon you’re talking about, the one who was proud and honored- he doesn't even seem real.”

Shireen stood then and looked down at Sansa with those same heavy eyes: “I’m sorry that you never got to know him." 

Sansa pushed the Barrett away and shoved herself to her feet: “I did know him,” she said through gritted teeth. “He was my brother- my baby brother. I knew him when he was in diapers. I knew him when he was pulling Becca Barnes’ pigtails and when he got scared of the rats in the walls. I knew him-” Sansa broke off, huffing. “Did you know that he used to go to work hungover because he’d been out all night drinking ‘cause he hated going home? Or that he was three inches away from being in deep with the Irish mob and that I had to splint his hand ‘cause he broke it in some dumb bar fight? I held him when Marcy Costigan broke his heart and I held him during that first night in the trenches and I-.” Sansa laughed and it was ragged. “I knew my brother. I knew him when-” and suddenly Sansa stopped because that was it, wasn’t it. She’d known him when.

She shattered.

“God, I’m so sorry, Shireen. “I’m so sorry-” and Sansa finally cried. The sobs heaved out of her and they ran wet down her cheeks, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, oh god, I’m so sorry,” she blubbered, flinging off the protective glasses and burying her head in her hands. Shireen’s arms went around her, coaxing Sansa and murmuring in her ear. Shireen let Sansa sob, let her dirty up the shoulder of her uniform, all the while running her hand through Sansa’s hair.

It was a piece of comfort that Sansa hadn’t even known that she was desperate for. For the first time in- the first time in- Sansa let herself feel warm. She burrowed into Shireen and Sansa thought of her mother, of the way that her mother had held her before the serum took over everything. And she missed them so much- her parents. She cried for them and she cried for her family and then, for once, Sansa cried for herself and everything she’d lost because she really, really wished that she could have known her brother.

**

“Look,” Shireen whispered. “You’ve got to let somebody in. It doesn’t have to be me and maybe it shouldn’t be, but you have to let someone in. Or-” Shireen glanced down and her eyes went far away and Sansa would bet twenty dollars she was thinking of Rickon. “You’ve got to let somebody in.”

Her thoughts turned to Sandor and how she’d come so close- but that stung so Sansa pushed it away. “I-” don’t know how anymore “I can try,” and even Sansa wasn’t sure if she was lying anymore.

**

Sansa sat in Randa and Mya’s kitchen, deveining shrimp for the jumbalaya. She’d never had jambalaya or shrimp but distinctly remembered the night in Brighton when they’d been put up in a fisherman’s cottage. Three pairs of dog tags had been hanging from the mantle. The widow had cooked lobster- a gift from the neighbors. She’d said they’d have gone to waste otherwise but Sansa remembered thinking that she was just glad to have someone to cook for again.

It was one of the warmest nights of the war.

Randa’s kitchen was nothing like the dreariness that had hung over the widow’s cottage. It was bright and colorful; yellows and purples and blues and oranges with beads hanging in the doors and artwork on the walls. Jazz was pounding out of the speakers, blending with the scent of the cajun spices and sauce for the jambalaya. A picture of Mya and Randa laughing hung on the wall, their arms wrapped tight around each other.

Sansa had never been in a kitchen like this one- had never been in any place like this one. Her apartment with Arya had been home but always too hot or too cold and carried a lasting sense of being overused and old. Her parents’ kitchen only ever had whatever groceries Sansa bought for them and was always just a little bit messy, a little bit lonely.

It was pleasant and easy, sitting in Randa’s kitchen, listening to the woman talk about the children in her kindergarten class. It was nice how Randa hadn’t mentioned the fading bruise on her cheek where she’d been caught with the butt of a gun. But out of the corner of Sansa’s eyes, Sansa’s own eyes were staring back at her and they were burrowing beneath her skin.

She’d noticed the poster on her first night in their home. She’d noticed it every time she’d come over since. It was a painting of someone who looked remarkably like her. The woman was coiled up like a pin-up girl, a gray dress hugging her curves, legs on display with garter belts and stockings, a smirk and beneath  it all was the text “she’s beauty, she’s grace, she’ll punch you in the face.”

“Do you want me to take it down?” Randa asked, drawing Sansa back into the kitchen and away from a theater in Harlem that had been closed for years.

Sansa shook her head, working her throat around the words: “No, it’s- it’s okay. I don’t mind. I- it’s my favorite one I’ve seen so far.”

It wasn’t a lie. Randa didn’t look mollified so Sansa put on a smile and ducked her head, getting back to the shrimp. It wasn’t all a lie.

**

Sansa bought lavender curtains and hung them in her bedroom.

**

When the ambush had started, Sansa had believed that it was going to be the hardest fight she’d had in a while. It’d been exciting; the opportunity to lose herself in the combat. Even during the war Sansa had been able to take herself out of the equation. Her mind narrowed until there was nothing but the mission.

But this fight was hectic in a way that Sansa didn’t like. Their intel about the Warlocks- a terrorist group primarily operating on a scientific front- hadn’t even hinted towards this kind of manpower. Her team had prepared for a covert mission and expected to mostly be slinking about in the shadows and quietly capturing the scientists one by one. This though, this fight was out of character. Chaotic in a way that the controlled, careful Warlocks never had been.

Sansa blinked, realizing. “This is a distraction,” she said into the comm. 

Red Thorn responded first and Sansa could barely make her out from her perch in the rafters: “How can you tell?”

Sansa drove her shield into of the enemy’s solar plexus, felt the crack. “Look at the way their fighting-”

“Seem to be fighting pretty hard to me,” Sellsword broke in and shot one of them in the kneecap. They had direct “No kill” orders. 

Rolling away from a hit, Sansa came up and heaved the shield. It ricocheted off the cement wall before rebounding off a man’s ribs and coming back to her. She turned and brought her fist against a woman’s jaw. “They’re not fighting to stop us,” Sansa answered just as another target danced out of her reach- like almost all of them had been doing. “They’re stalling us.” An arrow was suddenly in his back.

The comms were silent for a moment. “She’s right,” Agent Payne spoke up. “We need to find what they’re hiding.”

Sansa considered for a moment and the fluid movements of the fight came second nature. “Alright, Oathkeeper, take the top floors. Squire, I want you to find command, get whatever intel you can. I’ll take the basement. Thorn, Sellsword?”

“We got it, Cap,” Sellsword said with a smile in his voice and the gun going off. “These guys aren’t going anywhere.”

With the new, clear mission, Sansa finally felt her mind settle. The dark stairwell felt familiar, like all the missions she’d run during the war. She’d been trained to slink through the shadows. It was almost a comfort to be back in them. She let herself go blank.

Long hallways, poorly lit. No soldiers. No scientists. Multiple doors. Electricity so loud she could feel it thrumming. She kicked the first door in.

Empty room. Machines. Off. Chair. Leather straps. Metal table. Restraints. Needles. Tubes. Tray of- metal table. Retraits. Needles-

Sansa looked closer at the machines and the breath rushed out of her. It was 1943 and there was a metal table and a chair and needles and the constant beeping of machines and it was 2012 and there was-

“Mission objective changed. New priority,” Sansa said into the comms, rushing out of the room and going to the next one. Bashing in the door, she stopped herself from reeling at the familiar sight. “Warlocks have prisoners. At least-” Sansa paused to count the doors. “Seven, maybe more.”

“What? Intel didn’t show-” Oathkeeper responded, sounding breathless.

“There’s White Walker tech in this base. Modified, newer, but- they’re conducting human experiments. Squire, you connected yet?” Sansa moved onto the next room and stamped down her feeling of panic.

“Almost, Cap. Give me another minute. Control was empty but they’ve got good hardware.” 

Of course it was empty. The Warlocks had known  that they were coming somehow and left. She hoped they’d left the prisoners, she hoped and hoped.

The machines were still on in the final room, emitting a steady sound that was so familiar it set her teeth on edge. God, she’d wished that if this future could offer her nothing else that she would have never had to hear that beeping again.

“Cap, I found a cell,” Red Thorn said and there was some emotion underneath her words that Sansa couldn’t identify.

“Are they alive, are the prisoners-”

“Yes. They need medical but they’re fine. They’re going to be fine.”

Sansa let herself breathe finally and rounded a corner. She found a lab, scoured it for anything that could help, found nothing.

“Evacuation in progress. There’s eight of them and they say that there’s no one-” Red Thorn went silent and when she came back her voice had that note again. “There’s a kid somewhere in the complex. They don’t know where.”

“Top floors secure,” Oathkeeper reported.

“I’m in. Schematics show a room in the lower levels. It’s connected to a- it looks like some sort of cellblock? Turn left at the next corner. You should find it,” Squire said and she heard the typing in the background.

“Sellsword?” Sansa asked.

“I got the last of the minions down. We’re clear up here.”

“Then get them out,” Sansa said and took off down the next hallway, not even bothering to check the other rooms. She could see something up ahead, caught up in the shadows. A blinking red dot and the air was dense with the smell of sweat and fear.

It was a timer. It was a bomb. It said 30 seconds. Sansa didn’t know how to disable it. On the left was a steel door and a small window. There was a little boy inside.

“Thorn, there’s a bomb. Tell me they’re out. Tell me they’re the fuck out-”

“Yeah, we’re good. We’re good. But Cap-”

“Then get out of here. All of you.”

“What about-”

“Just go,” Sansa yelled and yanked the door off of it’s hinges. Inside the room, the little boy scurried away from her and Sansa wanted to be kind and soothing and gentle his fear but there wasn’t time for that. The beeping grew louder and insistent and that sound was also familiar and she should have known.

“No,” the boy whimpered, “ _no quiero_ -” The foundation cracked beneath their feet and Sansa lunged for the boy. Her hand closed around his wrist as she pulled him to her, felt his shoulder pop, and then the building crashed down on them.

Sansa curled herself over him, her knee slamming to the concrete and barely getting the shield up in time to take what impact it could.

**

She took the curtains down.

**

The first thing Sansa registered was the fluttering puffs of breath against her arm. The next was the boy’s whimpers. Then the voice in her ear.

“Cap? Cap, are you there? Oh shit, c’mon. Answer!” Sansa blinked. That was...was, Oathkeeper. That was Oathkeeper.

Sansa opened her mouth to respond, coughed instead, hacking up dust and grime. She finally noticed the strain on her right arm and the enormous weight of what she was holding up. A building. She was holding up the rubble of a building and for a brief moment even she was shocked at her own strength.

Her other arm was still holding the boy flush to her body and a slab of concrete was pressed hard against her back and the knee she had pressed against the floor was shooting with pain. The shield seemed to be keeping everything in place though so she just needed to hold on. Sansa didn’t know if she was strong enough for it but she was going to be. She had to be.

She remembered Oathkeeper’s plea then and spoke around her dry throat. “I’m fine. I’m alive. I’ve got the boy but we’re buried out here,” she heard the breath of relief. “Did you get everyone out?” Sansa asked. 

“Yeah, they’re all out. We got all the hostages out.”

“What about the mercenaries? The ones the Warlocks hired?”

There was a pause. Sansa closed her eyes: “Look for them. Save who you can.”

“Confirmed,” Red Thorn answered and Sansa finally recognized that the emotion in her voice was panic. “We’re coming for you. Just hang tight.”

“Roger that,” Sansa said and turned her attention to the boy.

“Hey there,” she whispered and willed herself to be soothing. “You alright? Does anything hurt?”

When the boy didn’t answer, she remembered what he’d said earlier. “ _¿Estas bien?_ ” she tried.

The boy sniffled, “ _Tengo miedo,_ ” and then whimpered again.

“Okay, _bueno_. _Bueno_. What your name- _¿como se llama?_ ”

He didn’t answer for a moment. “Gabriel.”

Sansa nodded, ignored the dull ache in her right arm, and bent her head just a little to kiss the top of his head. “ _Estamos bien_ , Gabriel.” He didn’t say anything back and Sansa scoured her mind for something that would soothe him. She used to watch Widow Arcadio’s daughter sometimes, even after Sansa had quit the factory. Remedios had been sick all the time and there’d been a song- it’d been for babies, but it was ringing through her head and blocking out everything else. So she began to sing.

“ _Que linda manita que tiene el bebé, qué linda, qué bella, qué preciosa es_ ,” and when she began to repeat the verse the boy started to turn his hand back and forth in small, scared little movements, and Sansa willed herself to last a little longer.

**

You wake up and there is a hand on your shoulder. The hand is shaking you. There is a distant impression that the voice-because there is a voice- is familiar. That the words are familiar. This is irrelevant. You are shaken awake by a warm hand on your shoulder and you are lying on a cool, hard metal table. There are no longer tubes in your arms. The straps restricting you are gone. There is a warm hand shaking you.

You register the knife on the young woman’s belt before you register anything else. You grab it and swing at the young woman. She moves out of the way. The others had not been that fast. You swing again and hit nothing. The young woman does not fight you and, inextricably, it feels wrong to be fighting her. You distract the young woman with the knife and when she dodges it, your fist collides with her face. You feel upset that you have hit the woman but you are also upset that you cannot hit her with the knife.

“-ansa!” the voice filters through the haze. It tugs at the back of your mind.

“It’s me! It’s-“ The young woman says a name and it is familiar. It is also irrelevant. But you are not fighting as well as you know that you can. You are faster than this young woman. You are stronger. You are deadlier. You do not fight the young woman as well as you know you can.  

“Sansa, snap out of it!” The young woman cries. Her voice is desperate even though her defenses are smooth and controlled. She is also not fighting as well as you know she can. How do you know this?

“Little Bird!” These words yank at your mind and you howl. You swing the knife with much more chaos than you are supposed to have. You will be punished for this. You try to gain control.  

“Little Bird! I’m your sister!” You falter for a moment and try to regain yourself.

You have no sister. You have no sister. You have no brother with auburn hair or brother who used to wear reading glasses or brother who smoked on fire escapes or a sister with bruised knuckles. You have nothing. You are nothing but a-

“Soldier!”

The word is like a whip and you stumble back. You stumble because you are a soldier and this young woman called you a soldier and the only ones that called you soldier were a brother with auburn hair a brother who used to wear reading classes a brother who smoked on fire escapes and a sister with bruised knuckles. You drop the knife even though you shouldn’t. Your legs shake and crumble even though you are stronger than that. You scream because you can’t stop yourself.

They took this from you. They took the brother with the hair and the brother with the glasses and the brother with the cigarettes and the sister with the knuckles. They took them and replaced them with an empty void and needles and tubes and hard leather straps and knives and orders to cut and hurt and kill. You howl because there is nothing else you can do.

There is a warm hand on your shoulder and you look up and Arya is staring at you. There is a watery gleam to her eyes and a bruise forming around her eye. You whimper.

“You’re safe now. We’re here,” Arya reassures you, her hand squeezing your shoulder. It hurts. You try to answer her and your mouth falls open like a gaping fish, the only sound a giant gasp of air.

“Breathe, Little Bird.”

You shrink from the name. It sounds wrong, somehow. Distant and unfamiliar. It doesn’t belong. Arya reads the tremor as something else. “You’re safe now. No one is going to hurt you. You don’t have to be afraid. I promise.”

Afraid. Afraid. Afraid. The word skips in your mind because you were not afraid. They didn’t let you be afraid. They carved into your mind with their wires and their electricity and their chemicals until there was no fear. Until there was nothing at all. Nothing but obedience. You were not afraid but they were. The prisoners were. You saw it in their eyes when-when the prisoners-when the prisoners-when-

“Where are they?” You gasp. “Where are they?”

“Who?” Arya asks, her eyes uncomprehending.

The hand on your shoulder all of a sudden feels like a cage and you twist away from her grip, launching yourself off of the ground. You don’t realize that you have also picked up the knife again. “The prisoners! Where are the prisoners?” You voice strains around the words because your throat is raw. You distantly realize that you have been screaming for weeks.

Arya’s face pinches. “Little Bird,” you flinch again, “they’re gone.”

“You got them out?” You ask, relief flooding through you. It leaves just as suddenly when you notice her shoulders tense.

“No, they’re…gone. We found them in their cells. The White Walkers must have killed them before we could get to you.”

You grip the knife tighter even as you clutch the sides of your head. The memories are starting to come back to you. They were afraid. The prisoners were afraid. They were afraid of you. Because you were holding a knife and a voice was telling you to bring it down on them. The prisoners were afraid because you were killing them.

“No…no, no, no,” the words tremble out of your mouth and even though your knees are shaking, you will not let yourself fall. You look at Arya’s face. “I killed them. It was me. I killed them.” You will not fall but you can’t keep looking at her eyes.

“What are you talking about? I know you couldn’t save them but that doesn’t mean-“

“It was me!” You yell. “They ripped me out of my mind and, oh god, what did they put in me? What did they do? I did it I did it I did it-“ The words keep tumbling out of your mouth. You see Arya glance around the room and you force yourself to look too. You see the hard lab table where they had strapped you down. You see the machine they had hooked you up to. You see the tubes hanging off of it uselessly. You see the needles at the end of them. The mouth guard is on the floor. You can’t stop looking at it.   

“Little Bird,” she begins and you have the unbidden urge to raise the knife at her again. “Sansa,” she tries again and somehow that is even worse. “What did they do to you?”

“They took me out,” you whisper because you cannot think of another way to put it. “And they made me…”

Arya rushes to your side and it takes so much effort not to put the knife at her throat. You let her put her hands on your face, you let her look into your eyes. “It wasn’t you. You said they took you out. It wasn’t you then.”

It was though. Because you remember doing it. When they gave you a knife, you used it. When they gave you a gun, you used it. When they put you on the table and put the tubes back in, you let them.

“I need to see them,” you say, pushing Arya away. Stumbling, you make your way across the room and ignore her protests. You remember the way to the cells. You remember it with sickening clarity.

You vomit when you see them and all that comes up is bile. The bodies haven’t been moved. Not one of them. You can’t remember if you were told to kill them all at once or if they made the prisoners sleep with the dead. You will remember soon enough.

“Sansa, please,” Arya says behind you, her hand coming to rest on your arm.

You shake it off: “Don’t touch me.” It is unbearable. She doesn’t move to touch you again. She also doesn’t try to stop you from looking. She doesn’t speak at all.

“How long was I here?” You ask.

“A little over a month.”

“Why did it take so long?” A part of you thinks it isn’t fair to ask but they are your pack. You are supposed to protect each other.

“You’re the one who gathers that kind of intelligence. The bastards kept transferring you. We didn’t know how to find you. You’re better at it than any of us. I’m sorry we couldn’t do it faster.” Arya’s words are sincere, the apology heavy with truth.

A month, you think. A month and they took so much of you out that you could be ordered to kill innocent prisoners. A month and you did it.

Her hand is back on your shoulder. The grip is hard, bruising. Direwolf is using all of her strength. On anyone weaker, their arm would be broken. “It’s your fault,” she hisses in your ear. The words feel like a betrayal but you know that she’s right so you don’t argue. She grabs the back of your head and slams your face against the bars: “Look what you did. You’re a killer. Did you like it? Did it make you feel powerful?”

You cry out, the sound having only the barest resemblances to the word ‘no.’

“Murderer!” she yells.

Direwolf drags you away from the cells and up the stairs. Through your tears you can see that she has the snout of a wolf and burning red eyes. “Arya-Direwolf-please!” you plead with her even as you know that you deserve all of it.

You are outside the White Walker base. There is sunlight and it hits you like a burn. They are outside waiting for you. The brother who smokes on fire escapes has shriveled skin and hatred in his eyes. The brother who used to need reading glasses has three eyes that pierce cruel and heavy. The brother with auburn hair has a bullet hole in his forehead, his shield at his side.

Direwolf shoves you forward and you barely keep your feet beneath you. “Traitor,” Wilding rages.

“No,” you moan, “I’m not, I swear I’m not.”

“Liar.” Crow croaks at you, his three eyes like poison.

“I swear I’m not!” you plead again.

“Murderer,” Direwolf howls.

“Please!” you cry out. Because they are right but they aren’t and you can’t bear it either way.  

“Thief,” Captain America snarls, his voice sharp like steel.

The shield is in your hands and it is covered in blood. You try to drop it. “This isn’t mine!” You scream but you can’t drop it. It won’t fall, the leather straps fusing to your skin. “I don’t want it! I never wanted it!”

They close in on you. “Traitor,” Wilding rages. “Liar,” Crow croaks. “Murderer,” Direwolf howls. “Thief,” Captain America snarls.

There is a gun in your hand. Your hand lifts it up because behind you the White Walkers are telling you to do it. They say kill and you fire a bullet. Direwolf drops dead. Kill- and Crow crumples. You can’t see beyond your tears but your arm is steady and your aim is true. The White Walker says kill, and Wilding falls.

Captain America stands in front of you. He grabs your hand, the one holding the gun. He brings the gun up, fitting the barrel against the wound in his forehead. He won’t let you go.

“Traitor, liar, murderer thief,” he hisses. “Kill,” he commands. You don’t want to but you feel your finger start to curl around the trigger. “Sansa. Little Bird. Captain America. Kill.”

The ground freezes around you and he keeps screaming, “Sansa! Little Bird! Captain America! Sansa! Little Bird! Captain America!”

The ice grows up your legs, your arms. You pull the trigger. You kill your brother.

The ice spreads over your face and the words still ring out; Sansa Captain America Sansa Captain America милая-

The ice shattered.

Sansa’s eyes flew open and in a moment she’d pulled a knife from the man’s jacket and there was a tugging at her arm and beeping in the background.

“-ansa!” The man gritted out, his voice impeded by the knife’s pressure on his windpipe.

“Where are the prisoners?” Sansa asked, her voice wavering. This wasn’t familiar but it was just on the edge of recognizable. She was- Sansa was-she couldn’t remember. She couldn’t remember anything but there were tubes in her arms and a machine was beeping. “Where are they?”

“There aren’t any prisoners." The man said, honesty in his voice.

With a moan, Sansa brought the knife away and dug her fingers into her hair and ice crept into her lungs. “How many?” she asked. “How many did I kill this time?”

“There aren’t any prisoners.” The man with the scars repeated.

“Just tell me how many of the prisoners I killed,” she gasped.

“You didn’t kill any, милая.” She looked up at the name, at the note of tenderness in the voice. “I swear you did not kill any prisoners.”

Sandor’s eyes were softer than she had ever seen them. She whimpered and dropped the knife. It clattered to the floor. Sandor was here but he wasn’t supposed to be. She was in- in a- in the White Walker base and there was- a machine beeping faster faster faster and Sandor was- it was a bed and the White Walkers had never given her a bed they’d had hard metal tables and dunk tanks and- but there was a needle in her arm and a chemical flowing and it was going to- it was going to- the chemicals burned under her skin and ruptured inside and the chemical would- would- scar they would scar her but the room was bright and the base was so dark but the beeping of the machines-

A warm hand, a scalding hand, curled around her own, pulled gently at the fingers twisted in her hair and the ice started to melt except-

“You were dreaming,” he said, and she realized he was sitting in a chair. “I woke you up.”

Sansa felt her bottom lip start to quiver and there were tears welling in her eyes. Her breaths were still coming fast but the ice was breaking- Sandor was breaking it. Sansa tried to pull herself back together, not wanting Sandor to see her like this. She didn’t want anyone to see her like this and it killed her that someone had. It left her wanting to destroy something.

Slowly, she noticed the mattress she was sitting on, the papery dress and the IV in her arm. A hospital. Not a White Walker base. The drip wouldn’t hurt her. The machine wasn’t going to force her blank and empty.

There was a fierce pain in her left knee and her right arm ached and her back hurt. The building, Sansa remembered. She let the pain ground her; focused on the pulse of it as it shot up and down her leg. Time passed but she didn’t lose it. She held fast onto reality because the dream- Sansa had so many nightmares but that one, that one was the worst of them.

Sansa cleared her throat when she finally could, when the breaths were coming slow enough. She forced herself to lower her other arm and noticed that Sandor was still holding her hand. With the shame still raging hot inside of her, Sansa slipped free from him. Gently, she lowered herself onto the bed and stamped down on the fear that it might turn out to be a metal slab anyway.

She could feel Sandor’s eyes boring into her and collected her thoughts enough to ask about the important things: “Is Gabriel okay?”

Sandor nodded: “He has a dislocated shoulder.”

“Fuck,” Sansa breathed. Captain America wasn’t supposed to hurt kids. “That was me.” Sandor didn’t say anything.

“And the mercenaries?”

“Most of them died in the collapse. Some are in ICU. Some are fine,” his voice was steady and blank.

Sansa squeezed her eyes shut. There had been a no-kill order. She took the deaths on her shoulders. She could carry it.

“I didn’t expect you to care about them,” Sandor said. She met his eyes. 

Her chest went tight because had it been the war- but it wasn’t: “I’m supposed to be Captain America.”

He was quiet for a beat and then Sandor slid the knife back into her hand. It wasn’t until she felt its heavy weight that she realized her fingers had been twitching for one. She gripped it tight, breathed deep, and flipped it. It was a sick comfort. After a moment, Sansa finally allowed herself to look fully at the man sitting next to her.

He looked uncomfortable in the hospital chair; too big for it. There were bags under his eyes and his brow sat heavy. The black t-shirt he was wearing was wrinkled and there was dirt on his jeans and workman’s boots. Sandor’s hair was pulled back into his usual bun and the strands were greasy. She wondered how long he’d been there.

The window in the room told her it was night. It’d been night when they pulled her out of the wreck. Time. She’d lost more time and the last time she’d been wounded in the field she’d lost 67 years. “How long have I been here?” she asked, voice tight and small and she was trying so hard not to be terrified.

“Almost a day,” he said and Sansa could have wept in relief. “You were in surgery for most of it. You fucked up your kneecap pretty bad.” That explained the cast.

“How’d they put me under?” Sansa asked.

“Rhinoceros tranques.”

She almost laughed at the ridiculousness of it but the mention of her injuries had made her remember the pain. “I think they wore off,” she grumbled. Neither she or Sandor moved to call the nurse.

Silence came.

She flipped the knife again and again, drawing peace from the familiarity. Sansa worked up the courage to ask the question that’d been burning in her. “Why are you here?”

His eyebrows rose just a fraction and then his eyes narrowed, lips turned down: “A building fell on you.”

“Oh, stud, I didn’t know you cared,” Sansa drawled and then instantly regretted it when rage clouded his features.

Bolting forward in his chair, his hand suddenly wrapped around her wrist, stilling the motion of the knife. “Of course I care. Fuck, Sansa. Of course I fucking care.”

She looked away from him, knowing that she’d hurt him and wishing she hadn’t:. “Yeah, alright. Okay,” she murmured.

“Okay?” he asked, his anger still making him prickle. “That’s it? Okay?”

“I can’t do this today. I’m too tired, Sandor. I’m too tired for all of it,” she whispered and whatever was on her face made him nod. His hand moved down and cupped hers, soft.

“Okay,” he said. “Not today.”

**

“So there we were, comin’ in after three weeks in the fucking backwoods of France, freezing our asses off and gettin’ by on spam MRs and boiled water, and we get back, and the mess hall, they’ve got spam and spam and more goddam spam. We couldn’t do it, didn’t even go down for dinner, just went to our bunks hungry, wet and miserable,” Sansa took a swing of her beer, something light and tangy and made with apricots. “But you know, way I see it, I owe spam my life ‘cause that night the mess hall got hit by the krauts and the rest of the unit got blown to fuckin’ hell. I owe a lot to that canned shit.”

For a moment, Randa and Mya just stared at Sansa, and she quirked up her lips. Then Mya did. Then Mya started to snicker, and then a full bellylaugh erupted out of her. “Goddam,” she said between breaths, “Goddam, goddam.” Sansa threw her head back and joined in. It was a bursting feeling, the sensation rising up and through her chest and making her feel buzzed in a way that the alcohol no longer could.

Wiping away the tears at her eyes, Mya raised her beer up: “Here’s to spam; the best damn pararescue around!”

Sansa raised her own and clinked the bottles together: “May the devil take it!” She downed the rest of it, slammed the bottle down on the table, smile still in place.

“You know, when I learned about you in the history books, I never pictured the swearing,” Randa said, thoughtful, but Sansa didn’t begrudge her it because there was a glint of mischief in her eyes.

“I don’t think you can tell a war story without cussin’,” she shrugged as Mya passed her another drink. “How else you gonna talk about sleeping in mud and shit and guts and prayin’ to something that you’re not sure is even there and hopin’ to fuck that you get out of it but don’t really think you will?” Mya’s smile fell a little, her stance a little tighter, and then she nodded her head.

“I think Shakespeare did alright with iambic pentameter," Randa said, the sound of a smirk in her voice. It made Sansa like her. She liked them both.

**

Sandor was back the next day, quietly slipping a knife into her hand and taking the chair again. She flipped the knife in her hand and concentrated on the solid weight of it. The silence, as it always was, was a comfort. A part of Sansa, a part that still stung from their meeting in Red Hook, pushed against him; wanted him gone, his hand off of her because he was part of this world that she didn’t want, didn’t trust. But her metabolism was burning through whatever pain medication they had given her and her knee screamed with it and she wanted him there so bad she thought she might cry if he left.

She flipped the knife again and again, and Sandor’s eyes drooped shut and it was a sign of trust that Sansa didn’t think she deserved but was selfish enough to take. They stayed that way for hours; Sandor sleeping, Sansa on watch.

The door opened and Sandor sat up instantly, his hand dropping to his side for another knife. It was Shireen. His hand moved away. Shireen smiled and Sansa fought against the pain to give one back.

“The doctors said that you’re healing well and fast and should be ready to be discharged by tonight. They want you back for PT eventually but they can’t really say how long until then. They can’t figure out how fast you heal,” Shireen said, leaning against the wall. The harsh hospital light showed the faint circles under her eyes and the fine lines of her face. There was a scar peeking out for the top of her t-shirt. Sansa saw the heaviness on her shoulders, coupled with a little bit of hope when she asked: “Do you want a ride home? I can take you.”

Sansa couldn’t stop the alarm that rang through her. Sandor felt her tense and he squeezed her elbow, grounding. “No, but that’s real kind of you,” Sansa said in a rush, and then- “Sandor already said he’d give me one. Thanks, though.” Shireen’s smile faltered for a moment and Sansa felt a twinge of guilt. She didn’t want to hurt Shireen. The agent’s eyes flicked to Sandor’s and it dawned on Sansa what she had said. He didn’t like lying, she knew that and if he- Sandor nodded at Shireen.

"Я её отвезу."

Whatever it was he’d said, Sansa saw Shireen’s eyes soften and a little smile pull at her lips. She nodded and said, “Good, that’s good.” She stepped up to Sansa’s bed, bent and placed a kiss on her forehead, and then left, her steps silent.

Once she was out of view, Sansa turned to Sandor and her grip on the knife tightened. She found herself suddenly afraid. “Thanks for going along,” she said and her voice came out a little quieter than she would have liked.

He was wearing a familiar smirk: “I only have my motorcycle. I don’t think it will work so well with that,” he nodded his head at the cast on her leg.

“I was plannin’ on taking the subway anyway,” Sansa said, shrugging.

“Fuck that.”

Sansa raised an eyebrow: “I ain’t takin’ a cab. Prices like that?”

“Then you’re getting on the motorcycle,” it came out like a command and Sansa’s fear drained out.

“You don’t have to,” she said, a token argument.

“I will,” he paused. "Для тебя - что угодно, милая."

**

By the time Sandor pulled to a stop in the alley behind her building, Sansa was on the verge of tears and furious about it. Her knee pulsed and her hip ached from keeping her leg propped up and straight on the ride over. Sandor had been right; riding pillion with full leg cast had been more than awkward. It’d been excruciating.

Sansa looked up at the brownstone and almost whimpered at the thought of the three flights of stairs waiting for her. She’d seen Mya take them enough times to know she shouldn’t complain but she’d burned through the pain meds they’d given her at the hospital.

“This isn’t your building, is it?” Sandor asked.

Sansa paused, surprised. She hadn’t even considered giving him a fake address. She did now though. She thought about lying to him and found that she desperately didn’t want to, even if it meant trusting him with this. “Actually, it is,” she answered, and then, because it was another truth, “I figured you’d already know that though.”

His jaw clenched: “I’m not your keeper.” Sansa stayed silent. “I’m not a curr nipping at your heels or some pathetic bastard in a suit of armor in a fucking fairy tale. I’m the Hound and I do my job. I did my goddamn job.”

“I know,” Sansa breathed, her mouth close to his ear and her fingers digging deep into his side. “That’s why it hurts.”

Sandor surged to his feet and the sudden movement dislodged Sansa. Automatic, she shot out her leg for balance and she cried out. The pain whited everything out and she slid, crumpled, from the motorcycle onto the sticky cement of the alley.

Sansa gasped for air and Sandor rounded on her, crouching low and crowding her. “You are not the only one who knows pain, милая,” the petname, usually said so sweet, was spat out. “You lost your world, your family and you hide with your tail between your legs.” His hand gripped her chin and forced her eyes to meet his.

“You’re hiding just as much as I am,” Sansa accused.

“The world wants me hidden,” Sandor’s fingers tightened. Sansa’s inched towards his knife. “The House of Black and White made sure of that.” He grabbed her hand and pressed it to his scars. “Proof of loyalty from my brother and I-“ he bit down the words and Sansa understood suddenly why he looked ashamed.

“And you let him. That was yours.” Her fingers stroked his cheek.

It was like she’d stabbed him. Sandor’s eyes flung wide, mouth unhinged, the fingers on her chin dripping down to her neck.

Then his body tensed all over: “Fuck your pity.” Sandor shoved her away. Her cast caught on his ankle and Sansa braced herself against the onslaught of pain, refusing to let out the scream.

There was the click of a safety being turned off. Sansa didn’t have the time to shout before Sandor had Mya slammed against the brownstone, her head hitting the wall with a hard crack.

“Who do you work for?” he hissed and brought the knife to her throat. It drew up a thin white line, made all the brighter by the darkness of her skin.

“Sandor, stop-“ Sansa pushed herself up and the pain back. She didn’t have time for it.

“Go to hell, asshole,” Mya spat on Sandor.

“Who sent you?” Sandor pressed his knee into Mya’s gut and for the first time, Sansa saw what the Hound truly was; all that pent up fury and rage aimed, directed, controlled. It made him deadly. It made him lethal.

“Let her go,” Sansa commanded. “Now.” Sandor hesitated, backed off, just slightly, but it was all the opening that Mya needed.  Whatever training she’d had, it’d been good.

In a moment, she had their roles reversed; Sandor’s cheek mashed against the wall, arm twisted behind his back. Sandor met her eyes; he could be out of the hold in an instant, kill her even faster but he was waiting for Sansa’s order. She shook her head. He nodded.

“Grab the gun, Sansa,” Mya breathed heavily.

“Let him go,” Sansa said, making her voice calm.

“This fucker was hurting you,” she yelled and twisted his wrist harder. Sandor grunted.

“Yes, he was,” Sansa said. “Let him go.”

“Fuck that,” Mya was seething. Sansa could see the tremors of adrenaline in her arms, saw the sweat of it rolling down her temple.“I know shit was different in your day but in this era, we don’t let men get away with this shit. You hear that, asshole? I’m calling the fucking cops on you!” She slammed him against the wall again.

“Твою мать!” He threw over his shoulder. “Sansa, get this bitch off of me.”

Sansa ignored him because she knew what it’d looked like. She knew what Mya had seen. “Not that kind of hurt,” she kept her voice gentle, trying to put Mya at ease. “The way you’re thinkin’- that’s not how he was hurtin’ me. Never would.”

Sansa saw doubt flicker in her eyes. “He shouldn’t be hurtin’ you at all,” she said, still so angry.

“I’ve been hurting him the exact same way. Don’t make it right, but it’s the truth. Now c’mon, soldier. Let my guy go.” Another flicker. “C’mon, Mya. I’m Captain America. I’m fine.”

Mya finally stepped away, stumbling a little with the prosthetic.  Sandor pushed off the wall and turned to face her. He rubbed his wrist. Sandor glanced at Mya and- Sansa blinked because that was admiration in his eyes. “Spec-Ops?” he asked, masking it all with a sneer.

“Oo-rah,” Mya answered, teeth bared. “You hurt her again, I’ll fucking kill you.”

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Sansa grumbled when she saw Sandor tense again. Bending down to unhook her crutches from the motorcycle, she said, “Sandor, get me up these stairs and then you guys can rip each other’s throats out.”

“He’s not coming into my building,” Mya said and she picked up her gun; a threat. Sansa pushed down the sigh.

“Mya, please. I got three flights of stairs and a shattered knee cap.” When that didn’t convince her, Sansa closed her eyes and let the truth slip out: “He’s one of the only friends I’ve got.”

It took a moment and then Mya’s shoulders slumped: “You need better friends.”

Sansa thought of Sandor dancing with her, of the way he stayed by her side at the hospital, of how he slipped his knife into her hand because he understood that it could be as comforting as it was deadly. “He’s better than you know,” Sansa whispered.

She turned away from them, eyeing the short steps up to the entrance of the brownstone.  Now that her mind wasn’t distracted, the pain in her knee had come roaring back. The four steps were a promise of agony but Sansa gritted her teeth and faced them down. She’d had worse.

The crutches were yanked out of her hands but before she could fall, Sansa was scooped up into thick, warm arms and a hard chest pushed against her side. She squirmed, embarrassed and red-faced.

“Damnit, девочка. You’ll hurt yourself,” Sandor said.

“Put me down!” Sansa squawked, hitting her fists awkwardly against his chest. “I ain’t your bride and I sure as hell ain’t some helpless dame.”

“Но ты моя,” and his hands were cupping her gently, his arms a bracket and Sansa felt very warm and very safe because this was the apology that he would never voice.

“Yeah, well, it ain’t happening again,” Sansa grumbled more for  effect and he pressed her crutches into her hands.

“Huh,” Mya said and unlocked the building door in front of them. Sandor took her up the steps and into the landing. Mya looked like she wanted to follow them up to Sansa’s unit but Sansa shook her head.

“Just-“ Mya looked torn and it ate at Sansa. “I’m around if you need me.”

“Thank you,” Sansa said and meant it deeply.

**

Sandor carried her over the threshold and Sansa couldn’t stop her blush. Back before everything’d gone down with the economy, she’d thought a lot about getting married and how her husband would carry her into their new home just like this. Then Sandor stopped short, the door swinging shut behind him, and Sansa flushed for an entirely different reason because-

“This is what you didn’t want Baratheon to see,” Sandor said, quiet.

Sansa knew what her apartment looked like. A pile of purple drapes by the window. A few dishes in the sink. A laptop. Books. A mattress on the floor, blanket, pillow.

Empty.

“She worries enough about me already,” Sansa murmured.

He didn’t say anything to that, just brought her to the bed and placed her down gently, not like she would break, but like he cared. Sandor stood to leave but Sansa grabbed his hand and tugged him down beside her. She desperately needed to say something because he’d told her- he’d said- he’d trusted, even in his fury, and he needed to know that it wasn’t pity.

His eyes bore into hers and Sansa didn’t know where to start until, suddenly, she did. “It was Robb’s idea to steal some uniforms and sneak into the trenches. He’d made it sound grand- like we’d be makin’ a real difference and when he’d put a gun into my hands, it’d surprised me. I’d never really thought about the killing. I don’t think I’d really understood up until I pulled the trigger,” Sansa took a breath, traced the lines on Sandor’s palm. “It was hard on Robb, wore him down, but it was the worst for Bran. Even Rickon’s hands shook in the beginning. But me and Arya- it came easy as breathing. Killers made.” She brought her eyes up to meet Sandor’s.  “What about you, Sandor? You a killer made?”

He nodded; a jerk of the neck, a tick in the jaw.

“People like us- killin’ comes easy. And maybe that means we’re damned or demons or monsters but-“ and she gripped his hand tighter because this was the important part, “your brother, the House of Black and White, the White Walkers- SHIELD, it’s their fault the world’s full of people like us. Not ours.”

And when Sandor looked like he didn’t believe her, couldn’t, that was when Sansa kissed him. She put away all the words that they were no good with and let the pull of their lips say everything else, let press of them be the kind of silence that existed between them. The good  kind, the sweet kind, the kind that came on the cusp of a promise.

**

Sansa hung yellow drapes in the window.

**

She left them up.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some Russian Translations:  
> "милая"- sweetheart  
> "Я её отвезу."- I'll take her home  
> "Для тебя - что угодно, милая."-What wouldn't I do for you, sweetheart?  
> “Твою мать!”- Fuck your mother  
> “Но ты моя,"- But you're mine
> 
> Thanks again to arashi_opera on lovejournal for all her help!
> 
> Wanna know what's awesome? There is actual historical precedence for Sansa to know Spanish! In the 30s and 40s, Red Hook was mostly factory work and the majority of people who worked in those factories were Puerto Rican immigrants and young women. How was I going to pass up that opportunity?
> 
> And lastly, there's now a part 2 to the series: a Rickeen interlude that explores Shireen and Rickon’s relationship in this universe.


	6. Keep the Home-Fires Burning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a much longer wait than I had intended but it turns out that working full time and applying for grad school takes a lot of time. Who knew?

 

Sansa swept the Montezuma Red across her lips, patted them against the napkin and then puckered her lips. In the mirror, she looked garish and pale, the stunning red of the lipstick making the circles under her eyes all the darker. She wiped the lipstick off and then felt suddenly and terribly  bare without it- exposed. Her hand trembled as she reapplied the lipstick but it still looked too bright so she picked up the napkin-

“Jesus, Sansa. Leave it on, will ya? That’s the fourth time you’ve wiped it off,” Arya said from her sprawl on the couch. Sansa looked at cloth napkin and saw all the smudges. She dropped it fast.

“I didn’t realize,” she muttered and forced herself away from the mirror.

“I know,” Arya grumbled, sitting up. “I’ve been calling your name.” Her sister got quiet then, serious, and Sansa got scared. “You sure you should go tonight?” she asked carefully, like Sansa was an open wound.

“I’m not broken,” Sansa snapped and grabbed up her pumps.

“Didn’t say you were. I just thought, you know, we only found you a few weeks ago, and after the base you might not wanna go to a big crowded party full of people who don’t give a fuck about you.”

Sansa shoved the shoes onto her feet, all the way angry now. “Willas will be there,” Arya knew that, she knew that. “He cares.”

She felt her sister’s eyes; hard and cold and familiar. Arya stayed quiet though and Sansa’s chest went tight because Arya didn’t do quiet and Sansa rushed to fill the silence: “Willas cares and I’ll be fine and besides, there’ll be dancing so I’ll be fine.” Arya stil didn’t say anything and Sansa tugged at the sleeves on her dress, frantic, wanting to leave the room, itching for it. Her hand on the doorknob, Sansa looked back at her sister, saw all the worry etched there on her face.

Before the serum, Arya had been so small and she’d always tried to take up as much space as possible. After, they were all of them giants and right now Arya’s long limbs were held taught and close like all she wanted to do was be small again. She’d never, Sansa realized- Arya had never tried to be gentle with her before, had never felt like she had to be.

“He makes me happy,” Sansa tried, willing Arya to believe it  so she could stop being worried.

But Arya just shook her head: “No, he just makes you forget that you’re not- and that’s a whole different kind of thing.”

Sansa swallowed and went out the door; ran from it like the coward that she was.

The Howling Commandos had been put up in some fancy English manor with big green lawns and bushes that hadn’t been trimmed in a long time. The halls in the place were massive and cushioned with deep carpets and Sansa got lost in the whole vast money of it. Sansa had never, not in her whole life, felt so out of her depth.

The entire affair put her on edge; the marble ballroom floor and its arching ceilings and the army brass and all of their wives. The businessmen were talking with the politicians and were busy making the Starks into something they weren’t. Sansa tugged at her long sleeves, pulled them down as far as she could. The room was full of people that she didn’t know because Bran had gone to town to find Jojen and Rickon had gone with him to try and find something strong enough to get him drunk and god knew that Arya would never go to a party like this but Robb would and Sansa didn’t see Robb anywhere so maybe he wasn’t down yet but he should-

“Darling, are you alright?” Willas asked, coming up in front of her. His mouth was turned down and there was sweet concern in his voice. Sansa thought that if she could melt into his arms, everything might just go away.

Sansa picked up his hands, held them tight, and put on her brightest smile- the one that always reeled in a patron at Red’s- and said, “Of course. Everything’s swell.”

Willas turned shy, the way he did sometimes when he got nervous: “Would you like to dance?”

Sansa worked to keep the surprise off of her face. Willas hardly ever asked her to dance. He was always too self-conscious or wary of the pain it might cause him. It broke her heart a little that she had to turn him down. “I wish I could,” and his face fell, “but I don’t know how to waltz.” 

Willas laughed, the one he had for when he thought that Sansa was acting silly. “Don’t be absurd. Of course you can- you’re a dancer.”

“Sure I am, but I never learned to waltz. Now, you want the New York shag, I’m your girl.”

He stepped in close and wrapped an arm around Sansa’s waist. It was solid against her back and then he was leaning in, breathing, “You’re already my girl.”

Sansa’s eyes fluttered shut and a smile came up, small but real. “Please, darling,” he said, pulling back. “I’ll teach you, but please dance with me. I’ve simply got to hold you close tonight. The way you look in that dress- you don’t know what you do to me when you’re in blue.”

How was Sansa supposed to say no to that? She nodded at him and his smile made it worth it. And the waltz wasn’t so bad it turned out. Willas was a good teacher even if he couldn’t do it very well. He told her that he’d been taught it as a child before the polo accident that left his leg twisted wrong. The box step- well, it really wasn’t anything at all like the quickstep but the turns were a little bit alike and Sansa had to force herself not to go too fast or lift too high or bop as much. It was nice though, being held by Willas.

The problem, the real big one, the one that kept her from letting go and getting lost in the dance, was that holding her hand so high made the cuff of her dress slide down and there it was. A silvery white scar peeking out, just the tip of it. It ached, they all did, these long, thin lines from the chemicals that the White Walkers had forced into her again and again. Now, Willas’ fingers were wrapped around hers and so, so close to those fine threaded scars.

The music kept flowing and she counted the one and the two and the three and the one and the two and her pumps clacked and the three and the one and Willas’ hand pressed firm against her side and the two and off on the side a journalist was taking a photograph for the war effort and the three floor was polished to shine and the one couple came in close and Willas stumbled and the two and his face scrunched up in pain the three and Sansa’s vision was tunneling in on her wrist the one and the two scars were peaking through and the three trumpet players were good but the one played two loud and the three her fingers itched to pull up the sleeve and the one scar was it getting bigger? and the two and it burned up under her skin and the three and the one and the two and the-

Willas wrenched his hand out of Sansa’s grasp, clutching it to his body. With a twist in her gut, Sansa realized that she had hurt him. “Sorry,” she muttered, her voice a little shattered.

“It’s all right, dear,” he said but she could tell from the line of his shoulders that it wasn’t. But he smiled like nothing at all had happened. Willas was good at that- making out like there was nothing Sansa could do that bothered him. Sansa knew it wasn’t true but she also knew that he did it because he loved the rest of her to pieces.

“Come on,” he gripped her elbow. “Let’s get some champagne and I’ll show you the gardens. I summered here once as a boy- a guest to Lord Crawley- and the grounds are lovely.” Willas paused and smiled at Sansa, her favorite soft smile of his. “You were made to walk through gardens, Sansa. Positively born for it.”

Sansa dropped her eyes and blushed even as her stomach clenched up. She’d been made for a lot of things- dancing, maybe, before the serum, winning a war after, maybe to put her grip around a knife but she didn’t think she’d been made for gardens. It could be nice to pretend though, just for a night, that maybe she was.

She let Willas lead her through the ballroom, out the tall paned glass doors, down the grand stone steps and onto grass softer than any bed she’d ever had. Candles lit up the gravel pathways- soft, gentle light that German bombers wouldn’t see. Willas was right; lovely was the only word for the place. The big, wide expanse of it reminded her of Prospect Park and right then, Sansa would have traded anything in the world for a breath a Brooklyn air. 

Sansa wanted it bad; the drafty apartment and not these tall corridors, the nights sweaty from working instead of from a knife fight, feeting aching from a dance and not a march. It overwhelmed her. Desperation saturated her so she grabbed Willas too rough, and kissed him too hard, all so she could forget that Brooklyn was years and miles away.

His lips were too soft though and he was too gentle. Willas tried to guide the kiss, slow Sansa down, make her softer than she was. Sansa couldn’t stand it and brought her hands to his shoulders to pull him closer. His smooth hands cupped her cheeks and for just a moment he kissed her back like he meant it.

The kiss lit Sansa up because Willas hardly ever- his lips came down hard for just a moment and then just as suddenly, he pulled back. Sansa whimpered at the loss.

“We’re in public, darling,” he whispered. Sansa, who came from a world of chorus girls and dance halls and back alleys, was tempted to roll her eyes. But Willas, polite and gentle Willas, was from gardens and waltzes and Sansa supposed that public necking was something that just wasn’t done. Instead of pushing it though, Sansa nodded and stepped back, tugging her sleeves back into place.

“Sorry, Willas. I just got carried away a little. It’s-” she dropped her eyes. “It’s real pretty here is all.”

Willas seemed to like that because he took her and led her a little deeper into the garden. They came across a large pool of water, lined all the way around with blue and purple flowers. The moon reflected off of the water and all of it looked very soft.

“Say, isn’t that your brother?” Willas asked and Sansa jerked her head around. Sprawled out on a stone bench, his big limbs lank, was Robb. There was something in his hands and a hangdog expression on his face and he had sad, sad eyes. “He looks like he’s having a rather bad night. Do you think we ought to go talk to him?”

Sansa shook her head- not him. Robb never knew how to talk to Willas. “You go back to the party,” she said and put on her most dazzling smile. “I’ll talk to him and meet up with you later.” He seemed struck dumb by the smile- most men were and that was why she used it- but he managed to nod. 

“I’ll see you soon then,” he said and kissed her cheek, being awful sweet about it.

As soon as he turned back onto the path, Sansa moved to her brother’s side and sat down next to him. She knew that he’d noticed the two of them but it worried her that he hadn’t tried to hide his hurt. It wasn’t like him; letting other people see how the world pressed down on him. If it’d just been Sansa or another Stark- but he’d let Willas see and Willas had been right. It was a public place and that meant that he would have let anyone see.

It was a letter. There was a letter in Robb’s hands. It was a letter from Jeyne. She’d been Robb’s sweetheart for years. With a face like that though, there was only one kind of letter it could be. Robb held the letter carefully and it hurt Sansa to see that his eyes were a little puffy like he’d just stopped crying.

He didn’t say anything though and Sansa didn’t push it. Robb had always been like that; only talking when all of his thoughts were in order and laid out neat. Sansa waited, tugged down her sleeves, and waited a little more. She glanced at her brother and caught him staring at her wrists. “Stop that,” she murmured and jostled his shoulder. “It wasn’t your fault.” 

Robb frowned and opened his mouth, then closed.Then, he pulled away and put the letter into her hands before dropping his head into his hands. It was a single page, filled from edge to edge. Jeyne’s hand writing was loopy and precise.

 

_Dear Robb,_

_I see you up there in those newsreels they play and it makes me so proud to know that my best guy is out there winning the war. Captain America- my hero. Flynn wrote a whole article about you in the Worker (I put it in with the letter) and she came to me for an interview! Can you believe it? She thinks that Captain America is going to be a great symbol for the working class too and all the union workers. You’re going to win this war. I just know it. And even though I can’t wait for you to come home I know that you’re helping save the world and I couldn’t love you more. It warms me right up, seeing Captain America and knowing that it’s your face in his cowl._

_With all my love,_

_Jeyne **  
**_

Sansa looked up from the letter, confused: “This is what’s got you all upset?”

  
He took the letter back, set it down gently, and then, so damn soft in a way that she couldn’t be, he picked up one of her hands and pushed up the sleeve of her dress. The blue satin raked up and up, crunching, and left behind a network of pocks and scars from where they’d pushed the needles in and the chemicals had raged through her.

“This is what Captain America did to you,” Robb said hard and Sansa tried to yank her hand away, horrified, but he held on tight. “This is what I did to you.”

Sansa burned white: “No.”

“Sansa, I-”

“You don’t get to make this about you. It’s my pain and the White Walkers did it and it didn’t have anything to do with you,” she hissed and Robb dropped her hands, shocked.

He looked down and braced his arms against his knees: “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want you damn sorrys,” Sansa spat, all of a sudden sick of men who kept wanting only pieces of her.

“You’re starting to sound more and more like Arya,” Robb murmured, deflecting. “What happened to Sansa, huh? Where’d my sweet little sister get to?” He meant it light but Sansa had been asking herself that question for years now.

“I don’t think you want to know the answer to that,” she said, which was all she could do to spare him.

Robb glanced at her and then away: “No, I don’t think I do.” He reached out again for her arm and Sansa let him take it.

“They hurt you bad, didn’t they?” He asked, misunderstanding.

Sansa was tempted to tell him a lie- that they hadn’t. She was tempted to tell him a truth- that he’d lost sweet Sansa before the war even started. But he didn’t need any of those so she offered him a different truth even though it hurt her to give it.

“Yeah,” she said and sounded broken to her own ears. “Yeah, Robbie, they hurt me real bad.”

He tugged her down to the bench again and pulled her into a hug. Sansa knew, sure as the sun rose, that if Robb could put his shield around the world, he would. He’d give up the whole of his heart to do it. But he couldn’t, so Sansa let herself go small and limp against him and take the love he was giving her. She let him shield what he could. 

"Why'd that letter upset you?" Sansa asked after a long quiet moment.

Robb frowned and pulled away from her. “She’s got it all wrong. Look at me,” and he swept his arms down and out, bringing in the crisp lines of his dress uniform and the lush, opulent garden surrounding them. “I’m sitting here at this fancy party at a _lord’s_ house while thousands of men are sleeping in foxholes. I don’t even like champagne but I’m drinkin’ it because that’s what Captain America does. He shakes hands with politicians and eats fish eggs and sleeps on a feather bed all while pretendin’ to be just another grunt but he’s not. Jeyne can’t see it but Captain America’s the biggest lie there is.”

“I don’t think that,” Sansa whispered, quiet and feeling a little afraid. 

“How can you not?” Robb asked, his voice breaking around the question.

Sansa shook her head: “I went to just as many of those union meetings as you did and Captain America ain’t any of those things that we rallied against.”

“If Cap ain’t any of that, then what is he?” The thought that Robb- brave, strong Robb- couldn’t see the hero in himself shook Sansa up. It scared her because Robb out of everyone else was supposed to know what Captain America was and if he didn’t-

“I think that Captain America’s just a name, kinda empty, so you have’ta fill it. You’ve got to make it into whatever you want it to be. So maybe Captain America _could_ be just another propaganda stooge or maybe you make him into something different. Make him something more, something bigger.”

“Like what?” Robb asked, barely a whisper, barely at all.

“Make him stand for the big words, the big ideas. Make that shield about hope or freedom or liberty. You pick- but Robb,” and Sansa met his eyes, “You can make Captain America into anything at all so you’ve gotta make him something good; make him into something anyone can believe in.”

It was a tremulous thing, the smile that her brother gave her. It stung to see it, so small and fragile, but it was a true one. “Maybe you should have been Captain America,” Robb said and Sansa knew that he meant it. 

She wanted to laugh it off, turn it all into a joke but the thought of it- all that blood she’d spilled coating that shield- Sansa shook her head hard. “No,” she pulled her sleeves down, “you’ve always been the best of us.”

**

_-and when Sandor looked like he didn't believer her, couldn't, that's when she kissed him-_

-his lips were softer than all the rest of him; softer than the grip of his hands on her shoulders, softer than the tense line of his body. Softer than the whole of Sandor put together. His lips were the very truth of him. The way that Sandor kissed her held more honesty, more meaning, than anyone had ever offered her.

“The world shoveled its grime all over us but underneath- you and me, we’re the salt of the goddamn earth” she kissed him again, hard, so that he’d know the truth of it. “You understand? You got that?”

“Yes,” he said low. “Yes, да, _yes_ , yes.” He caught her bottom lip between his teeth, bit down.

Sansa sagged in relief and it was only his hard hands on her shoulders that kept her up. The world narrowed down to his touch. The tips of his fingers blazed against her skin and the press of his forehead against her own grounded her and his knee was anchored to her thigh. It’d been so long since she’d been touched like this. Sansa didn’t know if she’d ever been touched like this. All the men she’d ever kissed and even that Russian Night Witch with her red lipstick- they all paled in the sheer force of violent understanding pouring from Sandor’s lips. 

It overwhelmed her and she could tell that it was doing the same thing to Sandor. She could feel the frenetic energy of his hope, his desperation, his fear. It was all the same for her and, Sansa realized, that was the meat of the whole thing. Sandor’s touch burned her up and she ripped him to pieces and they tore in at each other because they were just one another turned inside out.

Sandor wore all that anger outside of himself and sharp and Sansa hid from it, terrified. Sandor was the colossal strength of her worn like armor and she was all the tenderness he’d tried to crush like a blight.

Never in her life had Sansa been offered the consolation that Sandor gave her- the salvation and promise of safe-keeping. Desperate to taste it- that shattering sense of being understood- Sansa kissed him again. She kissed him fiercely, secure in the knowledge that he, unlike all the rest, could bare the bitter brunt of her strength.

**

Agent Tarly was the first one to show her the photograph. After that, she saw it everywhere: on the news, on t-shirts, in magazines and newspapers, on posters.

Sansa didn't remember much after the building collapsed; remembered checking in with her team, remembered Gabriel quaking in her arms, but not much more. She'd put everything she had into holding up the rubble. Tyrell told her that it had taken hours to dig her out of the debris. By the end, they'd all been shocked that she was still conscious, let alone strong enough to stand on her own.

But she had. The last of the rubble had been lifted off and Sansa had risen up like Lazarus.

It'd been night and the lights from the construction trucks shined orange, and, muddied by the floating dust, the air brightened up like fire. Sansa had stood up from the destruction, Gabriel on hip and the shield held firm and steady on her other arm.

Captain America with her free-flowing red hair spilling from the top of her cowl, standing amidst the ruin, hard gaze to the horizon and a child looking deep into the lens.

And that was the photo.

Iconic, Agent Tarly called it when he handed Sansa a newspaper where it took up the whole front page; guaranteed to win the Pulitzer.

**

Sansa didn’t want Sandor to leave. He was pressed up against her back, fingers tangled in her hair even though it was unwashed and greasy. He was incredibly warm. She couldn’t even bear the thought of him leaving and losing his touch.

It was like she could finally breathe. Every breath she felt him take went straight to her lungs and filled her up with good clean air. Sansa had spent her whole damn life trying not to be selfish because there had been so many others that needed things more than she did. But Sandor- she wanted every last bit of him. She wanted to wrap herself tight around him and stake her claim. She wanted the whole goddamn world to know that there was no one else on this green earth that would understand her like he did.

It scared her though, this intense need inside of her, the idea that maybe now that he’d touched her and cut himself on her jagged edges that she would no longer be able to survive without him.

Sandor’s fingers tightened in her hair and he pulled her neck taught a little bit. “Your breathing was starting to speed up,” he explained, mouth pressed against her scalp. “Stay here with me.”

She noticed, now that he’d pointed it out, how her body had started to curl in on itself, how her skin stung like it was being burned by ice. His fingers tightened more and Sansa let the sweet little pain of it ground her.

“Do you hurt?” he asked, his other hand running down her thigh.

“Hm?” Sansa burrowed deeper into his side and he chuckled.

“Your leg. Does it hurt?”

“Oh. Yeah. A little bit,” Sansa lied because it was actually agonizing but he didn’t need to know that. 

Sandor’s fingers twisted her hair: “The truth, милая. You tell me the truth.”

Sansa gasped, “Yes. Yeah, yeah. I hurt. It hurts.”

“Bad?” he asked, hand squeezing just a little tighter.

“Bad, it hurts so bad,” she sagged in relief.

“Okay,” he said and gathered up her hair to kiss the back of her neck. “Don’t move.”

He was gone before she could protest. Sandor left a cold wake in his absence; chilled air rushing against her back. There was an ache in her chest as if Sandor had ripped up a part of her when he got up and to her shame, Sansa’s eyes prickled up with tears. Resentment followed on its heels because as much as Sansa knew that she needed him, she hated that she did.

When he helped her sit up, stroked her back, pressed the needle into her vein, Sansa forced all of that down. Sandor hadn’t earned her rancor, not when all he ever did was give her what he could.

The tranquilizer worked quickly and a tingling, numbing sensation oozed through her. Sansa hated it. It left her cold and terrified because what if she was freezing all over again and didn’t even know it. What if after the drug took over her she didn’t wake up for another 70 years. What if-

Sandor grabbed her chin and met her eyes. “You’re with me. Say it. You’re with me,” he gripped her chin tighter when Sansa didn’t say anything. Ice was creeping through her and her limbs felt heavy and terrible and the freeze was burning her up from the inside out-

A hand pressed feather-light against her throat, warm, so warm, and Sansa gasped, air filling her up so fast that she felt dizzy with it. Her eyes found Sandor’s.

“Say it. You are here with me. Where are you? Say it.”

“Here. Here with you. I’m here with you.”

He pushed a strand of her hair behind her ear. “Умница” Sandor murmured low and sweet, kissing her sweaty brow.

The pain medication was doing its job but it was leaving her so sleepy. Sandor must have noticed because he lowered her onto the mattress but didn’t move to join her.

“I’m leaving tomorrow,” he whispered, like it hurt. “Rayder is sending me to Libya for a mission.”

Panic flared in Sansa’s chest, but it was dulled by the tranquilizer. She pushed past the numbness and said, “I thought I was your mission.”

HIs fingers tangled in her hair again and Sansa practically purred. “Rayder doesn’t think you’re going to run anymore. Mission over.”

“But you’ll come back to me,” Sansa stated. It wasn’t a question. His fingers were touching her and Sansa knew it wasn’t a question.

“I will always come back to you.” The honesty in Sandor’s voice was the sweetest thing Sansa had ever heard.

Sansa used the rest of her energy to tug on Sandor’s arm: “Sleep here tonight. Stay.”

He did.

**

Sandor screamed himself awake in the middle of the night, pulling Sansa out of her own nightmare. She turned over to find Sandor sitting up and breathing hard, a knife clutched tight in his hand. Gently, telegraphing her movement, Sansa put her hand on his back. Sandor’s shoulders stiffened but he didn’t pull away.

After a few minutes of his chest heaving violently, Sandor flung himself off of the mattress. He moved through the apartment methodically, checking the locks and windows, knife held at the ready. A perimeter check. Then he settled himself in a corner. It was the place with the clearest view of all the exits and vantage points. Sansa knew because she’d spent a lot of time in that corner. She knew what it was like to feel like the world was closing in around her.

“Sleep, девочка. Я тебя в обиду не дам,” he said, his voice a little hoarse from the screaming. "You'll be safe," he whispered, more to himself than to her.

Sansa nodded and closed her eyes so he’d know that she trusted him enough to let him keep watch. That was something that she could give him. Even then though, she didn’t sleep for a long time. His screams echoed in her mind and she wondered what he’d dreamed of. She wondered at his horrors, at what could make a man like Sandor Clegane scream.

**

“That guy- your friend,” Mya said, helping Sansa wrap a garbage bag around her cast.

“His name is Sandor Clegane.”

“Right, yeah, Clegane. He also a vet?”

Sansa paused. “You know, I’ve been thinking about that- well, not him. Just me. But, no, I don’t think either of us are actually vets. We never really-” Sansa groaned as Mya pulled her up. “We’re still fighting, you know. Never left the war. Just got into a different one.”

Mya pulled back the shower curtain and Sansa did her best not to stumble into the tub. “Don’t think you can really call us vets if we’re still fightin’,” Sansa said and tried to keep the bitterness out of her voice.

She turned on the spray, standing clear until it warmed up- a lesson she’d learned the hard way. Sansa heard Mya sit down on the toilet lid to wait. It itched at her, the way that Sansa needed help, wasn’t used to needing it, didn’t like needing it. But she’d tried once to do this on her own and she’d ended up slipping and cracking the counter where she’d caught herself. She’d bucked up then and took Dr. Lewin’s advice to “acknowledge her limits.”

“Do you want to stop fighting?” Mya’s voice drifted over the curtains.

Sansa huffed: “Don’t know what I’d do with myself if I did.”

“Literally anything you wanted.”

Sansa shook her head even though Mya couldn’t see it and stamped down the undeserved anger. Her hand squeezed the shampoo too tight and a huge clump plopped into her hand. “I was made for it- for fighting wars,” she willed Mya to understand, already knowing that she couldn’t.

She could hear the frustration in Mya's voice when she said, “You were made to do whatever you want to do.”

“No,” no, that wasn’t- “I was made out of chemicals and bottles and formulas. I came out of a machine just so I could win a war. My parents were _murdered_ so that I could win a war.”

Mya stayed quiet and it dug into Sansa like hooks.

“Look, it’s like at the factory. You’ve got your de-stemming machine-”

“Wait, what factory?" 

“The cigar factory. You’ve got the de-stemming machine for the leaves and it was made for one thing and it’s good at it. But all it does is that one thing and that’s what it’s good for,” Sansa tried to explain, knew she wasn’t doing a good job when Mya said, “So you’re a de-stemming machine?”

“Yeah,” Sansa said and rung her hair a little rougher than she had to. “Yeah, I’m the machine.”

Mya’s breath hissed through her nose and Sansa was shocked to find that Mya was just as angry as she was. “So you’re what- a machine made for war? For killing people? That’s the truth of Sansa Stark? Killing machine and made in China?”

“China? What does China-”

“Goddamn it, Sansa!” Mya shouted. “You’re more than any of that. Or at least you could be if you even stopped to think that maybe there’s more than just following orders and getting yourself blown up. I mean, fuck! Do you _want_ to die? You don’t have to keep fighting when it’s obviously tearing you apart!”

“Mya- I need you to stop,” Sansa breathed through her nose, her body quaking, warm water sliding down her body _too hot too much too fucking much_ and Mya kept talking and talking-

“They don’t own you! SHIELD or the army or who the fuck ever- they don’t own you and you don’t owe them shit-" 

And Sansa’s fist clenched, the tendons in her neck stood out and Mya’s words became a fuzz or white noise. It was all so- everything was so- Sansa wanted to dig into her own guts and rip out all the shrapnel or maybe pull out her heart, do anything to make Mya’s words -so, so many words- stop. But she didn’t. Mya kept talking and Sansa couldn’t hear a single word just the noise of it burrowing into her.

“Mya, please!” and Sansa hadn’t meant to shout, hadn’t meant to attack her friend. “Please, please stop,” Sansa whimpered. Mya did and the silence was heavy. Sansa’s body trembled and it didn’t matter that the bathroom was steaming, she was so, so cold.

“Then explain it to me, Sansa. Please,” Mya’s voice was quiet and hard.

Sansa laughed but it was just a scrape. Everyone kept asking her to do that; to explain something that Sansa really, really didn’t want to. She was so sick of giving things to people when it was something she didn’t want to be taken away. She was so sick of the questions. But Mya had asked and because Mya needed to know, Sansa gave up a truth, again, she gave a truth: “It’s a good fight. I don’t mind so much if it’s a good fight.”

“There’s no such thing as a just war. You ever heard that?”

She had. She’d spent a lot of time thinking about that; had spent years of her life thinking about it: “Yeah, yes. I-.”

“Then don’t tell me it’s a good fight,” Mya said, bitter.

Sansa closed her eyes, took a breath, dredged up words she’d learned a century ago: “My friend, you would not tell with such high zest to children ardent for some desperate glory that old Lie. Dulce et Decorum est pro patria mori.” Sansa swallowed. “Ask me, Mya. Ask me if it was glorious to die for my country.”

So quiet, so strong, Mya asked: “Was it glorious to die for your country?”

Mya had lost her leg and so much to the war and she had her own heavy burdens but she’d come home to Randa. Sansa had died and then had come home to find that she truly had given everything that she had. And Sansa knew that her hurts didn’t make Mya’s any lesser and that was why she was able to say it, was able to tell her: “No. No, it really wasn’t.”

“So why are you trying to do it again?” Mya hissed.

“Because it’d be a goddamn waste if I didn’t.”

**

Round, short and cheerful, Samwell Tarly just didn’t fit with SHIELD. Sansa kept waiting for it to make sense. Pod had confused her at first too but his field record was impeccable and in the field, Squire was fierce and relentless for all that he blushed and fumbled in the office. But Tarly, no matter how Sansa played him, stayed implacable and friendly. 

Tarly’s big, wide smile was calming and for all that she didn’t trust him because of it, it did make it harder for her to fight him on going to the doctor when, after a week and a half in the cast, Sansa couldn’t put any weight on her knee without screaming. Shoving down the shame, Sansa called Agent Tarly to tell him that she wouldn’t be able to go in to his office for their daily meeting and then the day had ended with him dragging her to medical and the doctors discovering that her body had not only rejected the metal pins and wires they’d used to reconstruct her kneecap, but that her body was in the process of forcing them back out of her body like bullets.

**

Dr. Lewin smiled at her. She hadn't said much this session but Dr. Lewin had an unbreakable patience. "It feels different now," she told him, pausing in her knitting.

"What does?" he asked.

"The hurting. It feels- heavier. Less sharp." She met his eyes and they were still so kind. "I'm not saying that you get used to it but-" her eyes dropped, "but you kinda get used to it."

**

Shireen had been the first with the laptop and then there was the agent who had shown her how to use a cell phone and then there was wireless internet- and of course the internet itself- and the cloud and Google and email and Facebook which was better than Google Plus even if Google was the best search engine and apparently Twitter was something that she should avoid entirely.

It was a lot and the truth was that Sansa tried really hard to understand it all. She’d dedicated a lot of time to learning how to  navigate SHIELD’s electronic database but then she’d taken one look at the remote control for Randa’s television and given up. A show about whining, Southern attractive vampires was good enough.

The point wasn’t that Sansa was trying so hard to understand modern tech. The point was that it wasn’t enough.

So Sansa hauled herself and her knee brace to the subway and to SHIELD HQ and to Pod’s office.

“Cap-” he startled, a wonder-wide smile on his face. “I didn’t-” he rushed to his feet and thrust his chair out at her. “Here, you should-” and then Pod started pushing piles of paper together and soda pop cans into a trash bin.

“Pod, it’s alright. There’s another chair,” Sansa said and lowered herself into it. She smile at him kindly and he blushed.

“So, Captain, what can I do for you?” He said and sat back in his own chair. He laced his fingers together on the desk and tried to look composed and professional. It didn’t really help; his boyish features were always working against him.

Sansa looked him in the eye, looked at him hard, until his back straightened and she could see the SHIELD agent inside of him. There was a reason Squire was on her STRIKE team.

“The bomb that took down the building- you’ve been analyzing it, right?”

Pod nodded: “It was pretty basic, as far as bombs go.”

“Simple isn’t really how to Warlocks do things,” Sansa mused, knowing that Pod would have already come to that conclusion.

“It was homemade, too. Rigged out of wires and batteries. Something hasty, made out of things that would have been lying around the base.”

Sansa paused to consider. She’d assumed, because of the mercenaries, that the Warlocks had been expecting them but if that was the case they would have used their own tech. She’d seen the schematics of Warlock explosives and Pod was right- the bomb that had taken down the building was a hackjob. “If they weren’t expecting us, then why were there mercs,” she asked, as much to herself as to Pod. 

‘They’ll be expecting us now, though.”

Sansa sat back, blew a breath out of her nose. “We’ve got the briefing in a couple hours. I want the rest of the team’s input. But,” Sansa leveled Pod with a another look. “Could you have disarmed that bomb?”

Pod’s face crumpled a little: “It wasn’t your fault, Cap.”

Sansa shook her head, dismissing it, that wasn’t why she was here: “30 seconds left. Could you have disarmed it?”

After a moment, Pod nodded. 

“Good,” Sansa said. “I need you to teach me.”

**

Sansa was tugged out of sleep because Mya had -once again- changed her ringtone to Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy. She groggily groped around until she found her phone and answered the call.

“Yeah?” she said, rubbing her eyes.

“Sansa?” Sandor was breathing heavy, like he was too close to anger.

She yawned: “Whazzit, Sandor?”

“You are safe, yes?” There was an edge of panic in his voice but Sansa knew this kind of call, knew that sometimes, when Sandor was on a mission, he needed to make sure that she was still there. She understood.

“Yeah, stud. I’m safe. I’m real safe. Here in Brooklyn, jus’like-” Sansa broke off and sniffled a little, burrowing back into her pillow. “jus’like I promised.”

Flipping over, Sansa stretched out her long limbs and closed her eyes: “Wanna stay on the phone with me? Hear me sleepin’?” she offered, like she always did.

“да, Лисичка. Sleep now. Sleep.”

“M’kay. Jus’ listen. I’m safe,” Sansa murmured before tumbling back to sleep.

**

Sansa ran the mission from a conference room, each of her teammates’ comms hooked up to a camera and wired through to her live. She gave orders, analyzed data and felt, generally, useless, sitting in a plush office chair with her knee in a brace while her team- good agents, good people- put their necks on the line.

Adrenaline crashed through her, unfettered, for the entire op. From the team’s flight to an old masonry in northern Massachusetts, to Red Thorn shutting down security, through all the fighting with more mercs, to Squire securing the intel and Oathkeeper finding yet another lab with even more hostages and through until Sellsword detonated the charges and Sansa called the mission over, all from the 34th floor of a Manhattan highrise. 

Wasted. Useless. In desperate need of moving hard and moving fast and excising all the energy pent up inside of her. She wanted it out, wanted the Warlocks shut down and burned down and bones salted, wanted to figure out how they’d gotten the White Walker formula, wanted to cut it out of them, wanted to run, to hit a punching bag, to fight Sandor, to go for a walk without crutches and to do anything but sit in the blue light of her laptop and finish writing the report for a mission that she hadn’t really been a part of.

The clock on her laptop had jumped ahead 23 minutes. Sansa had completed the first section of the report. The cursor blinked back at her. Sansa clenched her fist and tried very, very hard not to punch the floor.

It didn’t matter that the doctors said that in another week, two at the most, she’d be out of the brace. She could barely remind herself that the mission had been a success and that no one had gotten hurt. Sansa remembered sitting in that sterilized room, watching the feed from her teammates’ cameras and felt sick all over again. No one had gotten hurt. No one had even come close but god-

Sansa shut down the image of watching, helpless, as Pod or Brienne or Tyrell or Bronn- as she watched like God from Manhattan as mercs got the best, got the upper-hand, took them down-

There was a scream bubbling up in Sansa’s throat and it felt like the endless waiting in the trenches all over again somehow. Her skin itched and her blood raged and Sansa kept waiting for the enemy to finally show his coward-face or for the shells to finally start dropping or for the shadow in the corner to turn into a White Walker agent so that she could finally get the fight out of her.

A car horn blared and Sansa snatched up her phone, calling Shireen almost without thinking.

The phone rang once, twice, four- “Sansa?” Shireen asked and even though it was past two in the morning, she didn’t sound like she’d been sleeping.

“You’ve got a car that goes fast, right?” Sansa asked, secure in the knowledge that Rickon had loved a good V8 and therefor Shireen must too.

“Of course,” the agent said over the line. “Feel like going for a drive?” Sansa could hear the concern under the smirk.

“Yes. God, yeah,” she answered, barely pushing down a rasp of a laugh.

“I’ll be there in 20.”

The line went dead and Sansa shut the laptop before scrambling for a pair of pants and her shoes. She threw up her hair in a quick braid and launched herself down the stairs.

When Shireen pulled up to the curb, Sansa was feeling flushed and thrumming. The car was a beautiful black slip of metal, something shining and purring and completely new to Sansa. She hadn’t loved cars the way that Rickon and Robb had but this one, Sansa knew, this one was art. Getting out of the car, Shireen tossed Sansa the keys and walked around to the passenger side. Sansa’s mouth lifted up in a feral grin as she slid into the driver’s seat. 

“Get me out of the city,” she told Shireen. “Get me somewhere where I can let her fly.”

And Shireen did.

Took her through and out onto long dark highways with nothing but rolling hills to either side. Black stretches of roads that went on for miles. Sansa got the engine roaring, let it howl, and somewhere along the way, Sansa found herself laughing. It was maniacal, desperate, a yowl. She gripped the soft leather of the steering wheel tight and flew down the roads. A glance at Shireen told her that whatever wild thing was raging through Sansa had passed through to her friend; glint and chaos in her eyes too. 

**

Sansa pulled the car over at a lookout point; some forgotten blip in the center of New York. Leaning against the guardrail, she breathed in deep and fast, feeling like she’d run a race. Finally, after weeks of pent up energy, Sansa felt her body start to relax, piece by piece. Shireen was sprawled against the car hood, stargazing, and Sansa looked up, to see what there was.

A big black void and a mess of stars. Sansa felt it in the pit of her stomach. It wasn’t a thing you could ever get used to.

**

The drive back was calmer and Sansa took the time to really appreciate the car, to let herself feel how smooth it was and take in a breath of the leather seats. A thought occurred to her.

“How’d you get to me so fast?” She asked Shireen. “I thought you lived up in Inwood.”

“I was visiting Rickon.”

Sansa’s heart skipped. She swallowed and forced her throat to work: “Where?”

“Greenwood Cemetery. I don’t like to go during the day- too many tourists.”

Sansa shook her head a little, feeling crushed in and just a little dizzy. Her grip made the leather groan.

“Are you okay?” Shireen asked, sounding puzzled.

“Yeah-” Sansa forced the word out. “I guess I never- I mean, graves. Of course there’d be graves. Don’t know why I never thought about it.”

Shireen didn’t seem to know what to make of that so she didn’t say anything for a long time. Sansa didn’t know what to say either. She tried to imagine it; Rickon’s name on a headstone, with the dates. Her whole family, she supposed, were they all- “Are we all there?”

“Yeah, by your parents.”

Sansa tried to take that in, found she couldn’t. “Not Arlington?” she asked.

Shireen shook her head. “By the time the government got their heads out of their asses and realized that they wanted to recognize you and Arya as soldiers, you were already buried in Brooklyn and- Rickon told it how after Robb got assassinated that Bran wasn’t going to let him be turned into a martyr when you and your sister weren’t and Rickon said that Robb shouldn’t be buried alone so it was either move you two to Arlington or bury Robb at home and, well, Brooklyn won out.”

Sansa swallowed. “I have a grave,” she tested the words out.

“Yeah,” Shireen laughed, an unexpected sound. “I wonder what they’re going to do about that.”

“Beats me. I’m still signing papers to get me declared as legally alive again.”

A long moment passed. “You want to go see them?” Shireen spoke up, hesitant.

“Yeah, yeah I think I do,” Sansa answered and followed the signs back home.

**

Sandor had scraped knuckles and a cut along the side of his hand. Lightly, Sansa pressed her fingers against the length of his. Early morning sunlight streamed in and made everything look soft, safe.

“Does it scare you?” Sansa murmured into Sandor’s shoulder. “How bad you need me? How bad I need you?”

He didn’t answer and after a moment, Sansa lifted her head from his chest to look at him. He was watching their hands so Sansa wove their fingers together. His breath caught, rattled out.

Sansa pressed her lips to his collarbone and breathed him in, the hair on his chest tickling her nose. “Yeah,” she whispered, bit him gently, “Yeah, it scares me too.”

**

Shireen moved towards Rickon’s headstone like gravity. They’d hopped the fence to the cemetery because it was after hours and Sansa had been worried that she wouldn’t remember how to get back to her parents’ headstone but Shireen walked the greens like it was an old, familiar path. Now, her friend sat back against her brother’s grave, nudging a model car out of the way.

“What is this stuff?” Sansa asked, gesturing to the trinkets and flowers and candles and pieces of paper that decorated the headstones.

Shireen picked up a toy soldier, twirled it with her fingers: “They’re thank you notes, signs of appreciation, stuff like that. It started after Bran Stark died and Jojen Reed came out about their relationship. People kept vandalizing Bran’s grave so gay rights activists started cleaning it up and leaving their own things behind to beautify it,” she tossed up the soldier, caught it, twirled it again. “It caught on." 

Sansa nodded slowly, sucking her lip in between her teeth. There didn’t seem to be much pattern or sense to what people left behind or even who they left them to but all the candles reminded her of going to mass and lighting one at the feet of a saint. She shuffled her own feet, forced the thought away.

Instead, Sansa knelt at her mother’s grave and ran her finger over the name. “They added a headstone,” she murmured. Shireen glanced at her. “We couldn’t afford one for each of them.”

She’d always planned on saving up so that she could get her parents their own headstone, maybe actually add the dates of their deaths instead of just their names. They’d tried to use Robb’s membership with the International Workers Order to get additional money but the truth was that every penny they had was going towards getting to Europe and the war and that there hadn’t been much to spare.

There were two headstones now though, so Sansa closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against the cold hard edge of her mother’s, tried to well up some sort of emotion. Nothing came. There was a beaker filled with daisies nudged up against her knee and someone had left, inexplicably, a bottle of vitamins at the base of her father’s grave. Sansa hadn’t had anything to do with these plots. She blinked, looked at Shireen whose head was hung low and was still twirling that soldier, and realized that her friend was hurting. She was hurting so bad.

Sansa stood and then carefully maneuvered the mementos so that she could sit at her side and take Shireen’s callused hand. Her fingers were cold so Sansa brought the knuckles to her lips and gave them a soft kiss.

Sansa didn’t say anything, let Shireen leech off of her. Idly, Sansa reached over and plucked up a note that had her name on it. She glanced at Shireen who met her eyes, blank and tired, and then Shireen shrugged.

“Nah,” Sansa dropped it. “I don’t think they’re really written to me, anyway.”

Shireen shuddered and then, like Sansa might run away, slowly put her head on Sansa’s shoulder and huddled in closer to the stone against their backs. Sansa held her tight so she would know that she wasn’t alone.

**

Physical therapy would have been a lot more tolerable if her doctor hadn’t started off by asking for a selfie.

**

The ice creaked loud, so very, very loud.

**

Sansa spent her 93rd birthday turning 26 and watching her country set off fireworks to celebrate its 235th anniversary.

Sandor was out of country but Shireen had a case of cold beers and a nice patio where they could see fireworks being set off over the ocean.

“I used to go to Coney Island with my siblings,” Sansa told Shireen as another firework went off.

“I know,” her friend nodded. “Happy birthday, Sans.”

“Thanks for spending it with me.”

“That’s what family is for,” Shireen smiled and Sansa clinked her bottle against Shireen’s before settling back into the lawn chair, her bad knee propped up so the brace didn’t dig in too much. 

Sansa felt warm.

**

As soon as the doctors declared her fit, Sandor took her to a gym in Queens where nobody looked at her twice or stared when she and Sandor fought each other like beasts.

The old woman working the hole-in-the-wall Russian diner beneath Sandor’s apartment in Rego Park didn’t stare either, just passed Sandor a bowl of borscht and went back to sweeping.

**

“You want a beer?” Sansa called over her shoulder as she opened the fridge.

“I refuse to drink anything but imported vodka,” Sandor growled and Sansa hid a smile.

“Yeah, why’s that?" 

“I’m Russian,” he said like it explained everything.

“What’s that got to do with anything?” She pulled two beers out of the fridge.

Sandor paused and when she saw his face he looked confused: “It’s- the Russian stereotype-”

Sansa plopped down on the couch next to him, her thigh pressed against his. “What’s a stereotype?” she asked, biting her cheek.

Sandor studied her for a moment. Sansa’s lip quirked up. He scowled and grabbed the beer from her. “Fuck you,” he said without any bite to it and threw his arm around her shoulder.

“Hey, you started it, trying to pull one over on me,” she grinned and took a swig.

**

Heavy sweat, layers of it, sweat from an hour ago getting tacky, sweat from five minutes ago sliding down her spine and the crown of her head. Damp hair and the burn in her muscles from a damn good fight. Sandor’s grey eyes cutting her and the plains of his stomach and back, ropes and ropes of scars, working up a lather from fighting her.

Sansa’s lungs were burning up and he kicked her in the ribs, sending her to the mat. She flipped up, snarled, and launched herself back at him, teeth feral.

Fighting Sandor was as good as kissing Sandor; he was unforgiving and relentless in both. Sometimes, after a hard fight, he’d pull her flush against him and pressed his lips to hers and that was Sansa’s favorite way to be kissed.

**

“Murderer-” Arya’s hands go over your throat. You thrash in the mud, choke on it and your sister’s hate.

You reach out to Bran but he steps back, the eye in the center of his forehead blazing: “I saw, I saw, I saw-”

**

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been- a long time since my last confession,” Sansa said into the quiet, heavy space.

“That’s alright, child. You’re here now,” the priest replied softly through the lattice. “What do you have to confess?”

Sansa dug her nails into her hands. She hadn’t gone to confession since she started working the Saturday morning shift at Murdock’s in 1940. There was a lot to confess but that wasn’t-

“We were told during the war that killin’ was okay so long as it was the enemy,” she forced the words up out of her throat before she lost her nerve. “And maybe that’s true, but maybe it’s not. I didn’t think about it a whole lot. I couldn’t. But- In 1942 I killed 27 people that weren’t the enemy,” Sansa didn’t even care that now the priest knew who she was, didn’t even care- “and I know, I know that I was brainwashed and forced to do it and the rest of the Commandos all said it wasn’t my fault but I keep on thinking, what’s the difference? My hand, my knife and they’re still dead, right?” Her breath shuddered. “They’re still dead,” she repeated, whispered and flexed her fingers.

The priest stayed quiet for a moment before asking, “Are you seeking absolution for their deaths?”

“No, no, I-” Sansa didn’t think she could ask for that.

“Then why are you here?”

Sansa curled her arms against her stomach, felt her heart clench. “At first I thought that it just didn’t make it into the history books like a lot of other stuff but then, then I looked it up in the old reports and Robb never even- he never even mentioned the prisoners. And I-” Sansa couldn’t bite back the whimper.

“I needed someone to know that it happened. Someone besides me had to know that I killed those people. Someone had to know.”

**

“Ma?” you whisper in the shell of a bombed-out London pub. She doesn’t blink- blank white eyes and no smile. “Ma?” you try again and take a step forward.

She holds out a vial, opens her mouth- a croak, a groan, a drip of spittle-

_Drink up_

**

Sansa came home from a five day mission hunting the Warlocks in Mexico to find a flyer taped to her door for a dance festival at the LeFrak Center in Prospect Park. She smiled to herself and took it off the door; Randa.

**

Jon’s eyes kept flicking back up to the TV behind Sansa’s head.  The Yankees were playing and much to Sansa’s horror, her cousin (first cousin once removed, according to him) had shown up to their weekly lunch date in one of their damn jerseys. The Yankees. _The Yankees._

Someone in her family rooted for the Yankees. Sansa wasn’t sure she’d be able to keep her shawarma down.

After her third attempt at wrangling Jon in for a conversation, Sansa pushed her plate away and settled back in the hard, plastic seat. “I’m flattered that you came out even with a game on but I ain’t playin’ second stringer to the Yankees. My pride can’t take it.”

Jon rolled his eyes and smiled dryly: “Everyone is second stringer to the Yankees.”

“Careful, pal. Those words’ll get you in a whole pile of trouble in the wrong neighborhood. In fact,” Sansa raised an eyebrow, “Why don’t we go watch the game at my landlord’s apartment? Show you exactly what I mean.”

He threw his head back and laughed and Sansa was always struck by how unstarched her cousin became when he wasn’t in the uniform. “Can’t say I like those odds,” he said as if he wasn’t Rayder’s right hand man and one of the most dangerous men in SHIELD.

Sansa ate a bite of her meal: “That’s because you know that you can’t buy us out.”

“Oh, is that how it is?” Jon asked and spread his arms wide. 

“Oh, that’s how it is,” Sansa smirked.

**

There were over a dozen knives laid out on Sandor’s coffee table and the only sounds were a whetstone sharpening steel and the soccer commentator yelling in speeding Russian.

Sandor was scowling and Sansa- well, it wasn’t baseball, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the screen either.

Russia scored. Sandor roared and Sansa leapt off the couch, cheering. She bumped the table and a knife tumbled off, skewering the floor.

**

Muttering under her breath, Sansa repeated the prompt from the “Beginner’s Mandarin Chinese” program that she’d downloaded onto her laptop. It was hard to wrap her Brooklyn tongue around the sounds and the _phonetics_ \- jeez, she was bad at the tonal differences. But she’d asked Jon what a useful language to learn would be, since she already spoke Spanish, and apparently Mandarin was the most spoken language in the world. Besides, it’d help her bargain down at the markets in Bensonhurst.

Sansa repeated another phrase and tried to figure out what had gone wrong in the coding project Pod had given her. If Sansa was grateful to the serum for one thing, it made multitasking whole worlds easier. 'Course, multitasking wasn’t so great when she was still typing so slow. Sandor made fun of her for it but she was getting better, honestly. It wasn’t her fault she’d never gotten typing lessons; there hadn’t been a whole lot of reason for a taxi dancer to learn a typewriter.

Sansa slurped at her alcha wot soup, licked her lips, and furrowed her brow. She was almost certain that she’d added semicolons where she wasn’t supposed to. Almost certain. She repeated how to formally greet an elder. She stared down the code and felt, not for the first time, like she was in completely over her head.

A plate crashed to the floor and Sansa was drawn back to the small Ethiopian café she was in. The place was mostly empty, like it usually was, just a couple of customers seated at the counter with her and keeping to themselves, but now their heads were turned to the TV that Lebna had mounted in the corner. Sansa blinked. Then she closed out of the language program and took out her earbuds.

The news was playing footage of that Lannister bastard in his shiny metal suit fighting some other bastard in another shiny metal suit right over her city. Sansa’s nostrils flared as Iron Man- and at least it was an accurate name- shot some sort of energy beam out of his hands, and somehow the goddamn asshole managed to miss his enemy and hit a building that still had people evacuating it.

“Motherfucker…” Sansa growled and snapped the laptop shut, and pulled her shield out of the gigantic tote bag that she’d taken to carrying everywhere. Jesus, she’d been carrying the shield around with her because Dr. Lewin thought it might help ground her when she disassociated it public. She hadn’t thought she’d actually need to use the damn thing. Hurriedly, she hooked the shield’s harness over her shoulders and swung the shield around until it caught the magnetic hook on the back. Then she shoved the laptop into the bag and turned to Lebna, finally noticing that the rest of the customers were watching her with wide eyes.

“Can I leave my bag here?” she asked the restaurant owner. “I gotta get down there, see if I can help with the evacuation.” Lebna nodded and Sansa handed over the bag. She’d been coming to the café for a while now, had even met Lebna’s wife and daughters. He’d keep it safe.

Then she was out of the café, scaling the building and taking off across the rooftops. The reporter has said that that jackass was fighting the other tin suit over Brownsville like he didn’t give a good goddamn about the lives he was wrecking. Sansa leapt from rooftop to rooftop, crossing Bed-Stuy and grateful to Tyrell for teaching her basic parkour.

In the distance she could see Lannister grappling in the sky, could see the way that he was putting on a show for the news helicopter. What an asshole. He was spinning through the air with flair, and his enemy was too busy trying to shoot him down to notice where those stray bullets were going. Sansa gritted her teeth, vaulted over a ledge and came up in a roll.

As she got closer, she could see a squadron of cops trying to conduct an evacuation of a public housing building. And the one next to it. And the one across the street. There weren’t enough cops, there were too many people and Sansa knew from personal experience just how many people could be shoved in that kind of housing. Sansa halted at the ledge of a bodega and grimaced, tried to figure out where she’d be the most help.

The shield pressed firm against her back. She felt its weight.

Backing up, Sansa took a running jump and hoped to God that she’d judged the distant right to get over the street. She hadn’t. Her fingers scrambled to grab the ledge, barely catching herself and slamming into the building and the air whoofed out of her. She’d bit the inside of her cheek and could taste blood. Ignoring it, Sansa hauled herself up and took off again. One more block and she’d be under the bastards.

Neither of them noticed her and for a fleeting moment, Sansa was sorely tempted to throw the shield at Lannister and quell his ego. But Sansa was Captain America so she studied the other man and she may not know much about modern technology but she figured a blow to the neck could knock anyone off balance, even a man in metal suit. Hauling her am back, Sansa aimed for the seam in the suit’s neck and let the shield fly.

It worked better than Sansa could have hoped. She saw a spark go up from the suit, heard the crack, and he went reeling back, spinning. By the time he’d regained himself and turned his guns back on Sansa, she had the shield back in her hands and adrenaline pumping through her veins. She hoped he’d come at her, wanted to bring him down hard and fast and show him that he should have picked a different city. Brooklyn was protected.

Iron Man saw his chance, and with a completely unnecessary barrel roll, shot his energy beam against the crack Sansa had created so Sansa created another one in the faceplate and felt a sickening satisfaction.

As soon as she was confident that Iron Man could handle the rest of the fight, Sansa gave him a salute and ran back to the evacuation site. It was- Sansa’s breath rattled. It was- it wasn’t as bad as it could have been, she tried to tell herself. She’d walked through the bombed out shell of Paris. She’d walked through Dresden. This was- this was- this was rubble in the streets, a corner blasted off of a building, a hole blasted through into a public housing apartment. There were ambulances but she didn’t see any body bags which was, that was good. That was so good. But there was a lot of- there was a lot of rubble and so many people lived in Brownsville.

Sansa squared her shoulders and walked up to the policewoman who seemed to be in charge.

“Excuse me, ma’am, I’d like to help, if I can,” Sansa said.

“Look, kid,” the officer huffed and turned around, “unless you’ve got some sort of medical training-” the woman paused, squinted her eyes, took in the shield strapped to Sansa’s back. “You strong enough to help clear debris?” she jutted her chin towards all the rubble.

Sansa nodded. “The construction crew isn’t here yet but I’m worried that there are people trapped under that shit. Dig around- careful, you got that? You be damned careful. Move around some of the small stuff. You’ve got enhanced hearing, right?” The officer paused while Sansa nodded again. “You hear anything, _anything_ , you shout out to the EMTs. Got that?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Sansa said and fought off the urge to throw another salute.

Sansa started to walk away towards the largest of the piles when the officer reached out again, grasping Sansa’s shoulder.

“Thanks, Captain. Good to have you on the team,” she said, her eyes serious.

Sansa tipped her head: “I’m here to help.”

She got to work.

**

Sansa hoisted a hunk of concrete onto her shoulder, wincing when the hard edge dug into her exposed skin. Behind her, she could hear the quick clacking of high heels against the street and Sansa’s closed her eyes. A reporter from the Daily Bugle had been clamoring for hours for an interview when all Sansa wanted to do was her job.

“Captain America! Captain America!” the reporter called out and Sansa steeled herself and put on a smile when she turned around. The woman was in smart business clothes and clutching her microphone like a lifeline. A cameraman and sound guy were quick on her heels. When the reporter reached her, she thrust the microphone into Sansa’s face and breathlessly said; “My name is Missandei Nakloz, reporter for the Daily Bugle. Our new helicopter captured footage of you fighting alongside Iron Man today as he took down a member of the terrorist group known as the Brave Companions. Tell me, Captain, are you and Iron Man going to be a regular team now?”

Sansa was shaking her head before the reporter had finished talking, trying not to show her annoyance on her face. “No, no I don’t think so. I was here today because I happened to be in the right place at the right time.”

“So you weren’t aware of the threat that was made against Iron Man this morning? SHIELD didn’t send you?”

Sansa frowned, shook her head. “I only became aware of the fight when I saw it on the news.”

Ms. Nakloz smiled: “That clears up the lack of uniform, then.”

Sansa glanced down, only now paying attention to her outfit. Running shoes, yoga pants and a red “Brooklyn” tank top. She hadn’t exactly been planning on a clean up operation today. She forced a smile: “There wasn’t any time to change.”

“And what about now? Should we expect more help from SHIELD during the clean up?”

“Honestly, ma’am, I’m not really sure. I’m not here because SHIELD sent me.”

“Then why are you here, Captain?” 

Sansa cocked her head to the side and shifted the slab of concrete on her shoulder: “Because I wanted to help. Because I _can_ help. And if you can help, then you should. Excuse me, ma’am.” Sansa smiled before walking away and dumped the small boulder on the pile that the construction crew was creating.

**

Jaime fucking Lannister was giving an interview about the fight with the Brave Companion. He sounded proud. He sounded smug.

What an asshole.

**

Sansa hadn’t heard _Bei Mir Bist Du Shein_ in so long, and it was so, so wonderful to know the words to a song, even better when there was an arm pressed warm against her back and a fella swinging her back and forth across the floor. It was like a hundred smoky dancehalls and it was like doing high kicks at the Aladdin because the trumpet player was a real swell player and oh but she thought she might love the man on the saxophone. Her partner was a stranger, some fella she’d picked up at the festival but even that was grand; dancing with a stranger and going wild on a hardtop. 

The floor was littered with couples and some weren’t all that good, and some gave Sansa a run for her money but there was a lot of laughter and the bar was serving shandy and Manhattans and Sansa had been dancing for what felt like hours. And she was in Brooklyn.

Sansa was dancing and she was in Brooklyn and with her body moving so fast it was almost like _Bucky’s got big strong hands and he can toss you through the smoky air in the hall. It’s Friday night and you can’t remember the last time that you didn’t have to work a Friday night. When was the last time that you laughed this loud in such low light? You don’t want it to ever end. You don’t want to remember that it’s winter outside. You want to love and to laugh and you want to be kissed and Bucky slings an arm across your waist and kicks his legs up and out. His brown hair is in a tumble and yours is coming out of your braid and when Bucky grins so big and wide and gobsmacked you just know that he caught of glimpse of his best guy and you laugh because isn’t love grand?_

The afternoon was bright and full of sunshine and even though Sansa had been dancing all day in her pumps, she thought she could go all night if she wanted. She wanted to never stop being a Jitterbug and she never wanted to stop hearing the deep brassy sound of the band. Sansa remembered the liberation of _Paris and a soldier steps up in front of you and there’s music playing out of the busted window of a restaurant and the soldier takes you by the hand. You’ve never met him but you can recognize the sheer relief at being alive for another day in his eyes so out in the brick streets of Paris, with knives strapped to your thighs and a rifle across your back, you take his other hand and pull him forward, push him back, and forward again. He spins you around and then into a six count and when you both laugh it’s loud and wonderful and hysterical._

The sun started going down four songs ago and the LaFrak workers had turned on bright lights two songs ago. Sansa had found a new partner, another stranger, who was just as tall as her and quick-footed. He had sweat rolling down his forehead and clammy hands but when the band started up a shag, she found out that he could do it like a New Yorker ought to be able to. The woman dancing close to her had sequins dripping down her dress and even a feather in her hair and _the stage lights are blinding and you have sweat slipping down your spine. It makes the stockings stick to your thighs and your shoes are just a little too big so after every performance you have blisters on your heel but you still kick your legs up as high as all the other dancers. You think that they’re starting to accept you because Connie helped you pin your hair since you were running late and Mary Jane had covered for you with the manager. The short dress is really just mesh and strings of fake diamonds and if your Ma ever saw you in it she might throw a fit. But you feel powerful up on this stage, even as you turn your back to the audience and_ _shimmy like Lorraine taught you._

Sansa didn’t want the night to end. She didn’t want it to ever end.

**

There are 27 prisoners which means that meant that there are 54 dead eyes in 27 heads and they all turn at once to look at you-

**

Sansa cased Lanniscorp Tower for three days before marching up to the receptionist and asking her to tell Jaime Lannister that she was on her way to see him.

Then she took the elevator up to the 37th floor and breezed past the receptionist and security and into the man’s private office. She closed the door with a sharp click and Lannister looked up from his desk, that same lecherous smirk spreading across his face.

He looked her up down, eyes crawling. She’d chosen her outfit carefully; pencil skirt and blouse, a pair of Randa’s heels that put her at 6’6” and a blazer. This was a power play and she needed to look the part. “Captain,” he practically purred, “did you miss me?” 

Sansa raised an eyebrow: “We need to talk.”

“About our spectacular team up? How we really should do it again some time? Maybe over dinner, at the London, let’s say. You can put on a little black number, I’ll bring my charm.”

“I want to talk about how you decided to have an aerial battle over a densely populated area when both you and your enemy could not only fly but were also surrounded by miles of ocean,” Sansa said and let the disgust filter into her voice. “I want to talk about how many people lost their home because you couldn’t fly a few miles east and not hurt a single person.”

Lannister’s smirk dropped into a scowl. “Lanniscorp is already financing the cost for reconstruction.”

“And in the meantime?” Sansa pushed. “What about all of the families that you put on the street or had all of their belongings crushed?”

Something hard flashed in Lannister’s eyes and Sansa was happy to see it, even happier when he pushed away from his desk and stood: “What about them?” 

“I watched those interviews about your reconstruction plans. New highrises? Luxury apartments? A modern apartment that a flat screen in every unit? You’re gentrifying Brownsville and pushin' out the families whose homes you didn’t manage to wreck.” When Lannister didn’t say anything, Sansa stalked forward and flattened her palms on his mahogany desk. “Did you even think about that?”

“Jaime,” a deep baritone voice cut through the tension in the room. Sansa turned and watched a man stride tall and proud into Lannister’s ridiculously large office. His skin was deeply tan and there were streaks of grey in his blonde hair. His suit was tailored to perfection and probably cost more than Sansa’s rent.

“Padre,” Lannister responded. He walked around the desk and shook his father’s hand. “This is Captain America.” He glanced back at her. “Sansa Stark- my father, Tywin Lannister.”

Tywin’s smile was sharp and his eyes tried to pin her down like prey. Sansa met his gaze, gave him nothing. After a moment, he came forward and shook her hand: “Mucho gusto.”

“Mucho gusto,” Sansa responded and didn’t smile. Tywin Lannister didn’t seem to be the sort of man that respected a smile.

“What seems to be the issue?” the man asked and dropped Sansa’s hand.

“The good capitán was just lecturing me on the proposed reconstruction plans for the Brownsville property,” Lannister said and Sansa narrowed her eyes. There was something -off about his body language. His patronizing slouch was gone, replaced with a rigid back and shoulders hunched in. He was- Lannister straightened his tie. Nervous. Sansa went on her guard. 

“Is that correct?” Tywin’s expression hardly changed, even though Sansa could hear the condescension dripping off of his tongue.

“I have concerns,” she said, refusing to be quelled by this man. He was just another rich suit and she’d been fighting rich suits since 1936. She’d campaigned with Liz Flynn and this man didn’t scare her any.

“And you think that there’s anything that you can do about these concerns,” Tywin’s mouth twitched as if he was fighting hard to keep his face blank. “Forgive me, Capitán, but you are neither a business woman nor a contractor. I don’t see that there’s anything that you can do.”

“No, I’m not. But,” and now Sansa did smile, teeth sharp and pointed, “I _am_ Captain America. And Captain America has a lot of sway. You don’t really want me to come out against your project, do you? After all, I’m the only one in the footage helping with the rescue effort. That doesn’t look so good, does it?”

She watched Tywin stand just a little straighter. “Now,” Sansa continued, “how about you decide if you want Captain America on your side or against and get back to me.”

**

Sandor held the deep red door open for her which Sansa was almost positive he did so that he could watch her ass. Sansa looked at him over her shoulder and flipped her hair back just so she could see him swallow. She felt a tug at the hem of her dress and as he trailed in after her and Sansa smiled. She’d thought he’d like the wine color, thought he’d like the way that it ran short on her thighs and showed her pale Irish skin.

He’d warned her that the bar was more of a dive than anything else, and now Sansa could see that he’d meant it. There were maybe four other men in the place, all of them sitting on their own and nursing their drinks. The yellow lights put most of the grime in shadows and Sansa’s shoes stuck to the floor a little bit. When they walked in, every head turned to look at them.

Undeterred, Sansa walked to bar and sat on a stool, smoothing down her dress. Sandor took the one next to her. The bartender turned to Sandor, already for a bottle of vodka.“Тебе как обычно, Клиган?” he asked.

“Да.”

The bartender thrust his chin at Sansa before saying, “А твоей подруге?”

“Сам её спроси” Sandor gestured to her.

“What do you want to drink?” the man asked Sansa in an accent even thicker than Sandor's.

Sansa smiled at him: “Whiskey, neat.” The bartender nodded, poured her a tumblr of Irish and gave Sandor a lowball of vodka. 

“Thought you weren’t a stereotype,” she teased him. He rolled his eyes at her and dropped a kiss on the crown on her head. Sansa couldn’t stop her blush.

“You know,” she said, looking around. “I think I had to pull Rickon out of bar fight in a place that looked just like this. Complete with surly Russians.”

Sandor laughed, “I think I helped Rickon win a bar fight in a place that looked just like this. Except we were actually in Russia.”

“Well, here’s to Rickon not being able to finish a bar fight on his own,” she smiled when Sandor clinked his glass against hers. 

“Here’s to long suffering sisters and the bastards he made friends with,” Sandor touched their glasses again and threw back the rest of his drink.

**

Tywin Lannister had smiled at Sansa when she left the office. It had been cold and knowing and despite agreeing to have a meeting, Sansa felt like somehow, she’d walked into a trap.

**

Sandor and the rest of the regulars at the Dead Rabbit helped Sansa find out that is she threw back 15 shots of vodka in a row, she could get drunk for about half an hour before her metabolism burned through it.

Yegor Mikhailovich, a shameless flirt and avid brawler, tried to keep up with her once. That night ended with him teaching her how the Tropak dance, and then, later, with Sansa up on a table and singing at the top of her lungs, _“Gory, gory what a helluva way to die! Gory, gory what a helluva way to die!”_ She was doing high kicks that Connie would have been proud of, _Gory, gory what a helluva way to die! Gory, gory, what a helluva way to die!_ The men were cheering and even Demyan behind the bar was laughing _And he ain’t gonna jump no more!_

Sansa threw in a shimmy, just because she could, and Sasha passed her another shot. She threw it back to a chorus of cheers, and belted out _“He counted long, he counted loud, he waited for the shock! He felt the wind, he felt the cold, he felt the awful drop! The silk from his reserves spilled out and wrapped his legs! He ain’t gonna jump no more!”_

“C’mon fellas, sing it with me!” and a gaggle of drunk men shouted out the chorus with Sansa. Even Sandor sang along, singing that it was one helluva way to die.

**

It was almost 4:00 in the morning and Sansa was coming back from the SHIELD gym where she’d been with Sandor for the past couple of hours. She liked the subway this early in the morning. It was full of people on their way home from the night shift, people on their way to the opening shift and the drunks who couldn’t be bothered with anything but their bottles.

Bed-Stuy was a whole other creature in the early morning. The streets were never really dead or quiet but people were more likely to mind their own business, even in this part of the neighborhood. That wasn’t to say that it was perfectly safe so Sansa wasn’t exactly surprised when she turned a corner and there was a man with a knife stepping into her space.

“What’s in the bag, huh,” the man groused and pointed the knife at the tote that she used to cart her shield around. “Huh, bitch, what’s in the bag.” He stalked forward and Sansa stepped back into the street light, waited for him to recognize her, blinked when he didn’t and then almost laughed because it seemed like she’d finally found someone who didn’t know who she was. “C’mon, hand it over,” he hissed and Sansa finally took the time to look at him. 

He was a sweaty, pale mess in dirty clothes, shaggy hair and a beard. He was shaking, the knife wavering in his hand. “C’mon!” he yelled and Sansa saw that his teeth were rotting.

She shook her head: “I can’t do that.”

“I’m not asking!” he took a small lunge at her, not like he actually wanted to stab her, just like he wanted to scare her.

Sansa’s eyes narrowed. The kid was shaking out of his bones, spooked, his eyes glancing away every couple seconds, going wide and wild. Drugs, definitely. Sansa frowned. She really, really didn’t want to hurt the guy. He needed-

The man made a grab for her tote and Sansa stepped out the way, watching him stumble forward. She’d expected him to regain his feet but he didn’t, too high to do much of anything but fall to his knees. 

“Woah, hey, you alright?” Sansa asked, taking a step forward.

The man flipped over all of a sudden, his eyes too wide and swung out wildly. “Stay back! Stay back! They’re gonna- I gotta- oh god, they’re gonna get me, gonna get me-” He was making wide arcs with the knife and his eyes had gone terrifyingly blank. “What do I do?” he shouted up into the night. “Tell me what I do now!”

His eyes found Sansa’s and he looked terrified. Sansa just stared down at him, feeling completely in over her head. Should she call an ambulance? But what if the guy didn’t have insurance? She’d been reading about Obamacare in the paper and it seemed like not having insurance was still as much of problem as it had been in the ‘30s. Then the guy started coughing, hard and loud, and then he dropped the knife, turned his head, and he vomited. And kept vomiting. Sansa turned her head to give him some privacy and when the noises finally stopped she looked back and gasped. That was- that was a lot of blood. Without hesitating, Sansa pulled out her phone and dialed Randa’s number.

It took three rings before her friend answered, sounding groggy and annoyed. “‘Lo?” she mumbled.

“Hey, Randa, it’s Sansa. I need to borrow your car.”

**

“Is he gonna puke in my car?" 

“...I’ll put down some towels.”

**

Sansa dug out the guy’s wallet, relieved to find that he had an ID: Lom Greenhands.

**

Sansa scanned her SHIELD ID, gave her vocal and retinal scan, and carried Greenhands to the elevator, Randa at her side. She punched the level for medical. The guy might not have insurance but she was positive that with the grotesque size of her bank account, she could afford whatever SHIELD was going to charge the guy. At least the money would go to good use.

**

Randa fell asleep in the waiting room only to be shocked awake by her phone ringing. She fumbled for a moment before getting the phone to her ear.

“Yeah?” she asked, still more than half asleep. After listening for a moment, Randa sat up, ramrod straight and eyes wide. “No, baby, I'm fine. Promise, promise I'm fine. Sansa needed a ride to SHIELD. I'm okay.” Randa pursed her lips and listened again. “You're right, I should have left a note. Okay. Okay. Mya, you have to breathe. Can you do that? Can you breathe for me? I promise I'm safe. I'm sorry I wasn't there when you woke up. No, I know, baby, I'm sorry, but you have to breathe-”

Sansa got up, squeezed Randa’s shoulder and let them have their privacy.

**

Hours later, Randa was long gone, had to go back to the kindergarten, and Sansa was still in medical, waiting for any news. Eventually, Dr. Willow came out with a heavy, tired expression. Sansa stood up.

“We managed to stop the internal hemorrhaging but it's going to be a long haul before he'll be able to be discharged. He's severely dehydrated and I don't think he's eaten anything in almost a week,” Dr. Willow told her.

“What about the bloodwork?” Sansa asked. 

“This is where it gets complicated,” Dr. Willow flipped through her chart. “Most of his symptoms point towards methamphetamine, even found a baggie of it in his pocket that we sent to the lab. His blood work almost confirmed it.”

“Almost?”

Dr. Willow studied Sansa for a moment before handing her the chart. Sansa stared down at it for moment, the whole thing a mess of chemical formulas that she didn't understand.

Until she did. 

“You’re sure?” she asked, her voice a scrape.

“The blood work got flagged by the main servers almost immediately. We didn't even know what it was until we were given clearance to the information. Nasty stuff.”

“Yeah, it is,” Sansa whispered. She stared down at the formula on the stark white page and couldn't stop the tremor in her hands because this- this same formula was in every Warlock base they’d raided, every one of their computers that Pod had hacked, in every blood sample they'd found in every fridge. 

Sansa was very, very tempted to scream.

**

Lom Greenhands died four hours later, thrashing in the holds of a seizure and blood foaming out of his mouth.

His death matched the report of 25 other cases in New York City. 

Sansa went down to the gym, broke two punching bags and this time, when she wanted to scream, she did.

**

Sansa had a patch of freckles on her ribcage and it was Sandor’s favorite place to touch her. Sometimes, Sandor would pull Sansa out of her nightmare, ease the ice out of her frozen limbs and lay her out. Splayed in his bed in his Rego Park apartment, deep in Queens, Sandor would ruck up her shirt and place such a gentle kiss there that Sansa thought she might cry.

“Where are you?” he would ask, low and prostrated against her stomach and Sansa with a breath that might have been a sob would answer, “Here, here, I’m here with you.”

**

Sansa looked at the holographic charts that Pod was remotely projecting into her apartment. Blown up large and blue, was that same familiar string of letters and numbers.

"Is it-" 

"The same chemical compound the Warlocks are using for mind control? Yeah, that's the one. It's just been reformatted so that it looks and acts like meth, just with the added side effects of increased aggression, violence and a strong response to suggestion. Something’s wrong with it though. It's not acting like the chemicals that we found in the Warlocks’ bases. That one doesn't kill its users. We think it’s because of the different format. The chemical is causing a different reaction.”

Sansa’s nostrils flared: "And this is across the board? All the samples we got on the streets came up with this?"

"Yeah, Cap," Pod paused, sounding hesitant, "We have to get out in front of this. The potential of this drug-"

"Call the rest of the team," Sansa cut him off because she knew, better than any of them, she knew. "We're going to meet at HQ, make a plan and figure out who the hell has been poisoning my city."

Pod nodded, "On it."

He cut off the comms and the holograph went with him. Sansa sunk back against Sandor, incredibly, achingly grateful that she'd let him into her life if just so she didn't have to be alone right now. His arms wrapped around her and even if she was still terrified and shaking in her goddamn bones, at least she was warm. 

A minute. She let the terror have one minute of control. Let it rattle around in her chest and roil in her stomach and block up her breathing for just a minute. Just one short little minute with Sandor pressed behind her and cooing in Russian. 

Then Sansa brought her hands up and gripped the arms wrapped around her waist. Her breath rattled but that was alright. The minute was up and she'd done it; she'd beaten the fear again.

"You know what I'd be really good at?" Sansa asked and it came out rough. "Firefighter. I'd be a great firefighter. ”

Sandor didn't say anything, just pulled her a little closer. 

Sansa let her head droop. “Sorry, Sandor,” she mumbled. “They used that drug on you for decades longer than they ever did on me.”

Sansa went quiet then and Sandor let her. The fear was threatening to take over again but it’d had it’s minute.

She huffed and unwrapped his arms to grab up her shield. He followed her to the door and Sansa paused, looking out into the hallway of the brownstone that was starting to feel like a home. “Firefighter though,” she said and Sandor pressed his hand to the small of her back. “I’d make such a good firefighter.”

**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, is that the plot? Yes it is! Also, who's ready for the Sand Snakes?
> 
> Russian translations: 
> 
> “Умница” Sandor murmured low and sweet, kissing her sweaty brow.- “Good girl”  
> “The truth, милая. You tell me the truth.” - “The truth, sweetheart. You tell me the truth.”  
> “Sleep, девочка. Я тебя в обиду не дам,” - ‘Sleep, girl. I’ll keep you safe.”  
> “да, Лисичка. Sleep now. Sleep.” - “Yes, little fox. Sleep now. Sleep.”  
> Тебе как обычно, Клиган?” The usual drink?  
> “Да.” Yes  
> “А твоей подруге?” And your lady?  
> “Сам её спроси” Ask her yourself.


	7. You or Your Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The important things take time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been a while. Sorry about that. It's been almost a year since I started this. Which is kind of crazy. This story got really far away from the original plan but I think it's better for it. 
> 
> Also, I just want to warn you guys that this chapter has some graphic depictions of torture that deal with Sandor’s backstory. It's a pretty heavy chapter but I promise that there are sweet moments too.

“Alexander, wake up. You need to wake up now.”

A big hand shakes his shoulder roughly but Sandor burrows further into the dark corner of the closet. He doesn’t want to be awake. “Sandor, you need to wake up. It’s okay. He’s not going to hurt us anymore,” his brother whispers and finally, Sandor opens his eyes. Yegor is staring down at him with his big wide eyes and there is a streak of blood across his forehead and more blood dripping from the skin under the eye that is already beginning to bruise.

His brother’s hand cups Sandor’s face: “I promise Father won’t be able to hurt us anymore, but we need to leave. Now.”

 

**

The punch came from a mile away and Sansa let her head roll with it to lessen the impact. Even still, her cheek collided with her teeth and tangy blood filled her mouth. She sucked on the cut, worked up a lather.

The doctor stepped up: “Tell me, Captain, who do you love most in the world?”

Sansa had to laugh then. She let her bloody teeth show and then spat for effect; a splash of red on concrete. What a ridiculous question to ask a prisoner. Although, she mused, eyeing the doctor up and down, maybe not so ridiculous if the prisoner hasn’t answered any of your questions and you were desperate for anything.

“Are they dead?” he asked like he thought that he could possibly use Sansa’s hurt against her. “Is there anyone left who would care if you died?”

There was a small pop in Sansa’s implanted earpiece so she swallowed and said the first words she’d spoken in days: “Sure there are.” There was a bang on the solid door and the doctor and the goon who’d been torturing her backed away. The next hit slammed the door open and all 6’4 of Oathkeeper, electric batons in hand, came barreling through. She put down the goon like he was less than nothing and when the doctor tried to run, she knocked him out with a swift hit to the back of the head.

“Hey, Cap,” Oathkeeper greeted as she gently lowered the doctor to the ground. She sheathed the batons and quickly zip-tied the man’s wrists behind his back.

Sansa tried very hard to ignore her pain.

“You look terrible,” Oathkeeper said and Sansa breathed out, breathed in, breathed out, pulled against her bonds, screamed at the flare in her shoulder, and the ropes broke away.

“You’re late,” Sansa panted and spat out the last of the blood in her mouth.

“Red Thorn needed a little more time than anticipated,” she said.

Sansa frowned and raised a hand to press against the mound of her popped shoulder. The timeline had been two days; Captain America sneaks into the Warlock facility, plants the hacking device, gets caught to distract the Warlocks so they won’t notice Red Thorn and Squire poking around. After two days, her team storms the facility, makes some good arrests, and gets Sansa the hell out of there.

That’d been three days ago and a dislocated shoulder and four ripped-out fingernails and what might be a shin fracture.

“Tell me you got the formula,” Sansa gritted out because that would make it all worth it.

Oathbreaker’s grin revealed all of her crooked teeth and all of her joy: “We got it. It’s already on it’s way to the chem lab.” She gestured at Sansa’s shoulder: “You want me to pop that back in?”

Sansa nodded. As Oathkeeper positioned Sansa’s arm, she asked, “My shield?”

Grunting, Oathkeeper yanked, pushed, Sansa shouted, lowered her arm and answered, “Sellsword secured it. It’ll be waiting for you in the Quinnjet.”

Sansa panted for a moment as she went through the flow of pain, agony, relief and then all of that dulled into a persistent ache. After waiting a moment to make sure Sansa wouldn’t collapse, Oathkeeper hefted the doctor over her shoulder. “Ready?” She asked, with kind eyes and compassion in her smile.

Sansa nodded and started to walk, leaving bloody footprints from the unhealed cuts on her feet.

She’d feel better when she got her shield back.

**

God but the world felt heavy. Sansa had meant- she'd meant to go for a run, to see that lawyer in Queens, she'd meant-

Sansa turned over on the mattress and it felt like dragging bones. The yellow curtains barely moved in the humid breeze and Sansa had to close her eyes and she tried to get a hold of her hurt, she’d planned to-

God but the world was heavy.

**

Sansa bent down low over her legs, feeling the familiar stretch of the muscles, held the pose. She closed her eyes and breathed in, grimacing. She was still doing the stretches that the physical therapist had taught her. The doc said that her knee was healing too fast and that the exercises would make sure that it healed the right way.

She shifted slowly, moving fluidly into the next pose so that her nose brushed against her knee. A laugh rang out through the gym and Sansa turned her head to look. Bronn and Tyrell had been sparring- a deadly, terrifying, thrilling sight- but he’d swooped her up into his arms, hands settling on the small of her back. Tyrell had been the one to laugh, startled into the sound and there was a look of joy on her face; open and honest. For just this moment, she’d been distilled into a young woman in love. Sansa smiled.

Bronn ran his hands up Margaery's sides, a caress. He slid one up her arm, taking her hand, the other pulling her taut against him. Then, with an exaggerated flourish and a grin that made him look much younger, he twirled her out and in and into a tango. Margaery laughed again and fell into step. She brought her hand into his and let him lead her across the mat. At the edge, they made a swift turn. Their bodies moved easily together, close together, made into one.

Just as quick as they’d spun into the dance, they moved apart and went back to the spar; as deadly and beautiful as ever.

**

Two nights ago, Sansa ran a recon mission where she got made, almost got captured, but got out without jeopardizing the next day’s mission. The next shift wouldn’t find the bodies until the Howling Commandos were already in position.  

On the way back, she stumbles against a tree, vomits, and when she looks up again, there is a grassy field just past the treeline and waves of wild flowers that look soft in the moonlight.

Yesterday, they ambushed the camp, found a heap of tortured corpses left behind by the White Walkers and blew the buildings all to hell.

Today, they are sprawled out in the grassy, flower-ridden field, waiting. Bran is hunched by the radio, turning the dials to find a signal but it’s not urgent. Things are quiet. The only real sound is Rickon cleaning a gun and wind going through the trees.

Sansa is splayed out on her back, head turned to the side and watching a clump of wildflowers sway back and forth. They have sturdy stems and delicate petals. She reaches out a hand- it moves too slow like the day- and she plucks one from the ground. Roots don’t come with it. She twirls it in her fingers for a moment and glances at her sister. Her eyes are closed but she’s not sleeping.

Sansa sits up, plucks another flower. Another. Slowly, in familiar movements that she hasn’t made in years, she makes a crown.

She puts it on her head and smiles, just a little. Then, because all she has to do is wait, she makes another one. And then one more. One more, one more.

When she stands, each of her siblings turn to look at her; the weight of Tully blues and Stark greys. She puts a crown on Rickon’s head and Robb laughs when she puts one on him and Bran wears his with a smile that crinkles around his eyes. Arya, though, Sansa holds out her hand to, the crown hanging limp from her palm. An offering.

Arya takes it and her smile is bright, bright, bright. Arya is not, outside of dark lit hallways and creeping through the night, often a graceful woman. Not because she is klutzy but just because she can’t be bothered. Now, she takes the crown made of purple and white and yellow, and places it on her head with more care than it really deserves.

“Your grace,” Arya dips her head.

Sansa curtseys, “Your grace.”

And then they laugh, full-bellied and well, even though nothing is all that funny but just because it feels good to do it. Then they are all laughing suddenly and Arya jumps up and starts to twirl, pulling on Sansa’s hand until they are spinning around and around and the wildflowers around them go blurry and the sun shines too bright because all of a sudden there are tears in Sansa’s eyes and she lets go of her sister’s hands.

There is Arya, standing with a flower crown on her head but covered head to toe in a deep green uniform with a belt of bullets looped around her waist and a blood stain that refuses to come out of her pants.

The world clashes and crashes and Sansa sobs and sobs and none of her family say a word because they had all cried like this before; nothing about this was new.

**

The office of Martell & Sand was decorated with warm browns and deep reds. The furniture had seen better days, as had the coffee table, but it had been well taken care of and was undeniably professional. The woman at the reception desk glanced up and smiled at Sansa although her attention was focused on the phone conversation that she was having. Her name plaque read “Nymeria Sand.”

Ms. Sand had a river of black hair spilling down her shoulders, thick and wavy and it shined. Her white dress was pristine and her nails were perfect. She was the jewel of the room;.Where the furniture was worn, she was immaculate. After a moment of listening, she spoke in rapid-fire Spanish, something about making an appointment to discuss an eviction notice and what action could be taken against it. Her voice was crisp and clipped. This was a woman who breathed efficiency and productivity.

After typing a few quick lines, she bid goodbye to the caller and turned her eyes to Sansa, running them up and down, calculating. Then she smiled bright and false and said, “Ms. Martell will be with you in a moment, Miss Stark. You can have a seat,” she gestured to one of the chairs.

Sansa smiled and sat, not bothering to pick up one of the magazines or fiddle with her phone like most people seemed to. Instead, she let Ms. Sand watch her as she looked around. To the left was a private office, the window in the door read "Arianne Martell" in crisp gold paint and on the other side of the room was a matching door with the name “Sarella Sand.” A family firm, Sansa mused.

After just a moment, Ms. Martell walked out of her office and came up to Sansa. Rising, Sansa shook her hand; it was a firm grip, just a little on the strong side as if she was trying to prove something. Her smile was fierce and pointed. Ms. Martell’s pant suit was expertly tailored and Sansa had the distinct impression that both the lawyer and receptionist were trying to make up for the rundown office by making themselves flawless.

“Ms. Stark, if you’d like to follow me into my office we can discuss what brings you here today?” Ms. Martell gestured towards the room on the far right and Sansa nodded and let her lead the way in. Unlike the warm colors of the reception area, Ms. Martell’s office was severe and white with a window looking out into the street. The office suffered from the same rundown qualities as the rest of the Martell & Sand. But then, it was an old building in Queens that had seen better days.

Ms. Martell watched Sansa for a moment, lips pursed. Sansa held shoulders up and her chin level, kept her jaw relaxed. She’d dressed in a sheath dress today and moderate heels- not as nice as she had dressed to meet with Lannister but well enough to give the impression of maturity and professionalism. She wanted this meeting to be a relationship not a power play. From the assessing looks that she’d gotten so far, it seemed like that’d been a wise choice.

“Why are you here?” Ms. Martell asked, deciding to be blunt. “I was under the impression that SHIELD had its own lawyers.”

Sansa nodded: “They do. But they’re not the lawyers that I need.”

“And what is it that you do need?”

“I made a bit of a rash decision a few weeks ago,” her lips turned up in a rueful smile. “I’m not too  proud to admit when I’ve made a mistake.”

Ms. Martell’s face stayed blank and interested, only raising a single eyebrow. Sansa tilted her head before deciding the best way to go about this. “You heard about the destruction of Brownsville?” she asked, sure of the answer.

“You mean the destruction that you and Iron Man caused?” Ms. Martell said, clearly unimpressed.

Sansa let the comment pass: “And you heard about the Lanniscorp plan to build high-rise condominiums in the area?”

Here, finally, Ms. Martell smiled, cold and bitter: “You mean the plans to gentrify a low-income neighborhood?”

“That’s the one,” she said, matching the lawyer’s smile. “I may have told Tywin Lannister that if he made any attempt to follow through with that plan that he would have to go through me.”

“May have?”

“Threatened may be a better word.”

“So you came to me for, what? Legal advice?” Ms. Martell was leaning forward now, obviously intrigued.

“I did my homework before choosing you. You’ve done similar work in the past, haven’t you?”

Ms. Martell nodded: “Not usually on such a large scope but, yes, I’ve done tenement law before.”

“You want to take on another case?” Sansa asked, acting nonchalant even though nothing about the situation was. Asking a small-time common law lawyer in Queens to go up against the gaggle of lawyers that Lanniscorp could toss at them wasn’t something to shrug about. But Sansa really had done her homework and if any firm was going to be crazy and passionate enough to take the case, it was going to be Martell & Sand, Attorneys at Law.

Ms. Martell leaned back in her chair and gave Sansa another long, assessing look. It was more thorough than the last one, more critical. After a moment she asked, “Why? And don’t give me those lines you pulled in the interviews about it being the right thing to do.”

It was a question that Sansa had anticipated and she had a carefully planned answer because it involved giving up pieces of herself. “How much do you know about the history of Brooklyn?” she began with.

“Not as much as I know about Queens.”

Sansa had expected this: “Brooklyn’s got a long history of taking care of our own. In the 30s, a lot of how we did that was with groups like the Committee for Industrial Organization and the Radical Women’s League. And I was part of all of that. I did my first strike when I was 14 even though lord knows I couldn’t afford it and I became a union maid and I joined the League because there I was, just some slum kid in a factory making 15 cents a day and for the first time in my life, I felt like I had power. Like I mattered, my friends mattered, my family mattered. ”

Sansa took a breath: “But that didn’t lead to much of a paycheck and I’ve lived in 17 different places in my life. The worst was some frame house in Navy Yard with rats and cockroaches and dirty air. The nicest place was a cold water flat in Brooklyn Heights for 15 months right before the war. Most times I left because the rent got to be too much but other times- the world was cruel to a lot of people and when they stand up and fight back, you stand up with them no matter the consequence. I don’t have many things in my life that I’m proud of but that, standing up, I’m proud of that.”

“So sure, I’m standing up for Brownsville because it’s the right thing to do but the truth of it is that I’m just angry. I’m angry that I woke up in your glitzy future to find out that there’s still people being treated like they’re not worth anything.”

“Then why not join one of the Brownsville groups organizing to stop the remodeling?”

“I have. They recommended that I come to you and I’ve been going to meetings, volunteering, doing what I can. But unlike back in my day, I’ve got a name and I’ve got money and maybe this time I can do more than I could before.”

“Let me get this straight then,” Ms. Martell said. “You threatened Tywin Lannister- one of the most powerful men in the world- that if he didn’t build affordable housing in the neighborhood that his son helped wreck that you would, what? Take legal action?”

Sansa shook her head: “It didn’t really get that far. Mostly I said that I’d throw my weight behind my legend and give him a hell of a hard time and turn the public against him. But I figured having a lawyer on retainer wouldn't hurt.”

“Are you an idiot?” Ms. Martell asked, incredulous.

Sansa laughed. “Oh, probably. Like I said, I think I made a big mistake but believe me, Ms. Martell, I haven’t given up on a fight in my life. I ain’t givin’ up on this one either just because he’s a fat cat with a billfold.” She sobered. “Are you going to help me?”

Their eyes met for a long moment. It was a big question, Sansa understood that. She was glad that Ms. Martell was taking the time to consider it seriously. Martell & Sand was a small firm if not necessarily new. It’d be their biggest case, almost unthinkably so but both Arianne Martell and Sarella Sand had the history that she wanted; community based, defenders, and had worked with community organizers. They cared about the people.

Finally, Ms. Martell nodded, a sharp quick movement. “Alright,” she said. “Let’s stop Tywin Lannister. First things first though- if you want to use your name as a weapon, you have to make sure it has power, that people know who you are. And I don’t just mean the name Captain America. I mean the person.”

Sansa sighed: “You want me to get a twitter account, don’t you?”

Her smile was all teeth: “I want you to get a twitter account.”

**

 **Captain America** _@Sansa Stark_

I believe I was promised flying cars #thefuture.

**

It was one of those murky, sweaty Monday evenings where Brooklyn skies were more yellow than anything else and it didn’t help having the fan on or the windows open or being stripped down until there was barely a stitch of clothes on you. And normally, normally, Sansa wouldn’t be thinking about it, was too damn thankful for being home to even think about it but-

Sometimes she missed the war. Not the war, but she missed having a reason to trek over hills in France or, once, during those weeks in Germany, going through Schwarzwald and seeing massive, rolling, stretching green for miles.

She missed it, days like this. She missed it.

**

Sansa clutches the prescription note in her hand, tight. It crinkles up and she breathes deep and blinks back tears. She can hear her father tinkering around in his lab, muttering occasionally. She can hear her mother wheezing in their bedroom. She makes herself look at the note again, read the number in the little box that was laughing at her; you had enough money for the doctor but not enough for the medicine.

Ma coughs and coughs and Sansa stands in a rush, pushing the paper into her trouser pocket. She hurries to the kitchen and wets a rag before going to her mother and pressing it against her forehead. Even through the damp cloth, Sansa can feel the heat radiating off of Catelyn. The room smells acidic and cryptic; sweat and the lingering stink of sickness. Catelyn is sweating through the sheets again and as Sansa wipes down her forehead, her ma’s bowls release and Sansa wants to scream. She doesn’t.

Instead, she rolls up her sleeves and turns her mother over and starts to clean her up. It’s been like this for days and she is resigned to the fact that cleaning up these messes is starting to get routine, even if it’s only been a little over a week. Three days ago, Sansa had come to the apartment to find Catelyn lying in a mess of her own shit, smelling like that’s where she’d been all day.

She’s never hated her father more; for not caring that his wife was sick, for not noticing the smell in the apartment, for not leaving his lab, for not getting a job, for not looking after young Rickon, for believing that the only thing in the world that mattered was finishing the serum for the betterment of humanity. Oh, she could hate him. But she tries very hard not to.

The mess her mother made is more liquid than anything; she’d only been able to swallow broth, and barely any of that, for days now. Her throat is too sore and swelled up for anything else, her stomach too roiled to accept something more. After cleaning her up as best as she can, Sansa bundles up Catelyn’s night dress and carries it to the sink where she could scrub at it and soak it for a while after that. First through, she fills the bucket up and carries it back into the bedroom and after wiping her mother down more thoroughly, puts her in a new nightdress and fluffs the pillows.

All through it, Catelyn moans and wheezes and sweats and her eyes slide right past Sansa and get heavy and hazy staring at the corner. Then Catelyn starts panting, pupils blowing up, and her chest heaving and then, and then, and then she goes utterly silent and still. For one terrifying, horrifying moment, Sansa is sure that her mother has died in her arms, naked and covered in her own shit.

Then she gasps like Lazarus and starts to cough and heave in air; a vicious cycle of in and out and in and out.

Sansa feels helpless but it’s not as horrible as it was in the past; she’s gotten very, very used to feeling helpless.

As she finishes wiping Catelyn down, Sansa runs through the same list that she’s been stewing on since Ma fell sick. It’s made up of numbers and dollar signs and Sansa’s utter inability to make it all add up. If this had all started up a week, no two weeks earlier, before all the rent was due and all the bills were paid, she’d have had enough. Sure, she and Arya would have been evicted again, but living rough for a week or so would be better than Ma being sick and there being no more money in the coffee tin. The money from the blue pictures she’d done last week had been enough for the doctor but what she had left over wasn’t near enough for the medicine. Or food. Not near enough.

Sansa hangs the washed nightgown on the wire outside that stretches from fire escape to fire escape, taking down the one that she’d hung up the day before. She folds it, dazed and dead eyed. She’s exhausted, her limbs dragging and heavy. She feels numb all over, like that night two winters ago when she’d tucked herself into an alley corner to sleep because a fella that she’d used to go ‘round with and had taken to using his fists on her was lurking around the building, waiting for her. It feels nearly just like that; very cold, very numb, and a sort of resigned terror and dull anger. Just like that.

Sansa turns and is confronted with the closed door of her parents’ lab. She stares at it and slowly, that dull anger builds a little, flares a little and she finds herself walking over to it. For just a moment, she hesitates, thinks about knocking, and then pushes the door open.

Ned is hunched over a notebook and taking glances at the beakers in front of him. He doesn’t look up. Sansa looks at him, feeling that anger still but mostly feeling that heavy exhaustion. Her head tilts and she wonders when her father got so old. A drooping face and greying hair with a hunched back and squinting eyes because she couldn’t afford to get him glasses.

“Scarlet Fever,” she says and her voice is flat.

He pauses and then, in the firm voice she remembers from when she was young, says, “Don’t be ridiculous. It’s just a cold.”

That’s when the anger comes back because how could he- how in the hell could he- “The doctor was just here, Dad. He just left. I have-” she fumbles for the prescription but can’t make herself take it out. “She’s _dying_. Can’t you smell it?” She asks and he still, damn him, he still won’t look at her.

She stalks forward, going further into this tomb of science than she has since she was 15 years old. “Don’t you _care_? Your wife is dying. The mother of your children is dying right next to you and you’re- you’re-” she snatches up one of the beakers that's filled with a horrifying blue liquid, “you’re in here working!”

That gets him moving. He pushes back from his stool before she can back away and snatches the beaker back. “Don’t touch this,” he says, stern, like he could control anything she does anymore. “Don’t touch anything.”

Sansa laughs, so bitter, and makes a grab for his notebook, getting it away from him: “I should rip this up! Burn it, maybe! You think you’d notice anything then? You think you’d care then!”

“Don’t take that tone with me. I am still your father,” there’s a fire in his eyes like he was coming alive, like he was finally realizing that there was a world beyond his vials and notes and drive to save the world from war by creating warriors.

“Are you? And here I thought these were your kids,” Sansa splays her hands out, bringing in all the lab with its precious and well cleaned equipment, the big iron lung leaning against the back wall, just waiting for her or her siblings to crawl inside and be injected once her father's work was done. “Here I thought you’d forgotten you’d ever had a family.”

She tosses the notebook on the ground and Ned forgets about the fight, automatically stooping to pick it up. He wipes off some imaginary dust and smooths down the page. He takes a deep breath: “This work is very important, Sansa. It’s going to save the world. I had thought you understood that.”

“Sure,” Sansa says and then, getting mean with it, playing dirty. “‘Course it’ll save the world. Won’t save your wife though. Sure as Sunday won’t do that. But you keep on workin’, Dad. Maybe you’ll at least notice when you lose your lab partner.”

She leaves then, sick of the conversation and sick of herself and closes the door behind her. Ned doesn’t follow, doesn’t call out or do a single thing at all.

**

Sandor slides the two watches, billfold and bracelets across the table to Yegor who snatches them up, grinning. Sandor smiles when his brother ruffles his hair. “This will feed us for many days,” he says and Sandor feels very proud of himself. He is getting very good at picking pockets. He had only been caught once today but he had run too fast for the man to catch him and he’d gotten the watch too.

It meant that tonight Yegor would be nice to him and that they’d have payment to sleep with the rest of the gang of boys instead of on the streets. It meant that they would be warm tonight. Warm and fed. It was the first good day in many days.

**

Robb turns the corner and Sansa pushes herself away from the wall. She watches him walk and he stands tall and proud with his chin up. She’s always thought that he was too good for their slum neighborhoods and the way that roaches got into all the apartments. He holds himself with too much dignity and with too much fight. He shouldn’t be working night shifts at the docks. But just like the rest of them, he’d had the bad luck to be a kid when Hoover was around and everybody was losing everything.

Finally, he notices her and his shoulders droop. She considers, for a moment, lying to him. But that wasn’t right. She was his ma too and he deserved to know. “That bad?” he asks when he stops in front of her.

She nods, swallows: “Scarlet Fever.”

“Christ,” he says under his breath and runs his hand over his eyes.

Sansa opens her mouth but the words get stopped up in her throat. She’d thought- she’d thought that after everything, she wouldn’t have any qualms with pride. Turns out she did but in moments like this, pride was the last thing that mattered, so she made herself give it up: “Do you have anything you can spare?”

She knows right away from the look in his eyes that he doesn’t, not that she’s surprised. “It got all used up on the Little Blue Books- we’re circulating that Bertrand Russel piece this time and it’s really gonna shake things up-” He stops, looks down, contrite and remembers himself. “Sorry, Sans. If I’da known it’d get so bad-”

“It’s okay,” she tells him and it’s mostly true. Both Robb and her dad are trying to save the world. Sansa could pick up the smaller pieces.

“It’s not, though,” he tries to argue but stops when Sansa puts a hand on his shoulder.

“It’s okay,” she repeats and makes sure that her eyes are earnest and sincere. “I’ll have enough.”

**

Yegor drags Sandor through the streets of Moscow to a part of the city that he has never been to before. It is a place where there a trees and clean sidewalks and there are no bread lines. It makes Sandor nervous and he fingers the torn and dirty hem on his shirt. It reminds him that he is barefoot and has not bathed in a very long time.

“Where are we going, Yegor?” Sandor whispers but his brother just yanks him along faster.

They eventually stop in front of a large manor with a tall iron fence. The house is white and it gleams but it has a black door that looks sunken and deep and there is an air around the house that makes Sandor want to run away. But Yegor has an iron grip on his arm and Sandor is forced to walk through the gate and up to the door.

Yegor turns to him, grabs his chin and yanks his face up: “You will not cry. You will not complain. You will be quiet. You will do whatever anyone asks of you. If you do all that, then we will live and we will never have to sleep in the streets again. Do you understand?”

Sandor nods his head and stays quiet. Yegor knocks on the door and a tall, thin old man answers the door. He smiles.

“Welcome to the House,” he says.

**

She sits on the fire escape and smokes her cigarette. Kitty Kallen croons from her neighbor's apartment about kissing after a long, long time. Inside, she can hear Rickon and the scratch of his pencil as he does his homework. She doesn’t want to risk him getting sick so he’s staying with her and Arya tonight. Bran will take care of Catelyn. It’s a lot to ask of a 16 year old kid but that’s how it was.

Brooklyn coal smoke is all around her and clinging tight but Sansa lets herself sink into this moment. Because tonight- well. She could really use a sweet moment before tonight.

**

Sandor slams Micah against the hard concrete floor and is proud of the force in his limbs, of the power that surges through him. He holds his friend down for a count of five and then stands back. When Micah holds out his hand for help, Sandor gives it, pulling him up.

“Best three of five?” his friend asks, although he is wincing and there is blood in his mouth. Sandor nods and they position themselves again. Fists up, bloody knuckles and when they charge at each other, they are feral but controlled, wiry grace and muscles forming in their young bodies.

Soon, Sandor hopes, he will be as strong as Yegor, although he doesn’t really believe that. He hasn’t seen his brother in days. The House of Black and White separated them weeks ago and at night, Sandor can hear the laughter of young men from the other side of walls. He wonders, as he blocks Micah’s fist, if his brother is laughing too. He can’t remember the last time his brother laughed.

A movement. Sandor flicks his eyes towards it, gets a punch to the stomach for it. A crowd of agents walk through the training room door; all in black and greys but even still, she makes herself known.

Yevgeny Sergeyevich shouts and the other children training with Sandor halt. He whistles so they all scramble into a line for inspection. Sandor stands as tall as he can, trying to flex his meager muscles. Micah slouches.

Everything is silent.

A boy coughs.

She is standing so tall, grey eyes piercing the wall. He has never seen someone stand so proud, for all that she is ignored, for all that she is empty. There is a rifle in her hands, a pistol on her hip and a harness with six knives lining her ribs. The mask on her face runs sharp on her cheekbones and not for the first time, Sandor tries to imagine what the woman looks like without it.

An agent steps forward and Sandor wrenches his eyes away from the Winter Soldier. He will be picked this time. He is sure of it. His knuckles are bloody- he throws a good punch. His partner yesterday has a cracked rib- a good kick. He is taller than the rest of the children he trains with. He will join his brother and laugh on the other side of the wall.

Sandor does not get picked. The next day, when he knocks Micah down, he doesn’t offer his help. It was a mistake to be kind.

**

The hairs on the back of her neck rise just as she’s slipping on her pumps. Arya doesn’t turn on the light, doesn’t make a sound. But Sansa knows she’s there.

“Where you goin’?” her sister whispers so Rickon won’t wake up.

“Late shift at Red’s. Then morning shift at Murdock’s,” Sansa murmurs and grabs up her coat.

“You told me you couldn’t get those shifts; you’ve been tryin’ all week.” It’s an accusation and Sansa bristles.

“You callin’ me a liar?” she hisses, not turning to look at Arya.

“Guess I am,” Arya’s up close to her now, just at her back, and Sansa feels the hard tension coming off of her. Sansa turns, makes herself do it, makes her get this over with.

“Then why’re you asking questions that you already know that answer to? You know where I’m going.”

The yellow street light pours through the kitchen window, dripping shadows down Arya’s face and her eyes are hard for a moment, like steel, like fire. Then a great big breath whooshes out of her and all at once, right before Sansa’s eyes, she looks small and sad and defeated.

“I was hoping that I was wrong,” she admits, dropped shoulders. Then, summoning that bright fire back, the one that makes Arya who she is, she declares, “There’s got to be another way. We’ll think of something.”

“You know there isn’t,” Sansa throws back, pushing down useless anger. “We’ve done everything we could. There isn’t-”

“I’ll sign up for those typing classes,” Arya promises, desperate.

“With what money?” Sansa pushes.

“Maybe tomorrow I’ll finally get a job!”

“You won’t get paid in time-”

“I’ll-”

Sansa grabs her sister’s arms, hard, and pitches her voice even lower: “There isn’t time. Arya,” she tightens her grip, “If she doesn’t get that medicine soon, tomorrow, she’ll die.” Sansa doesn't say that Catelyn might die anyway.

Arya holds the look for a moment and then looks down, draws herself in tight. “I could go,” she says quiet and scared but determined. “I could do it.”

A wave of love washes over Sansa, love for her brave little sister. She smooths Arya’s hair back. “No,” she kisses her sister’s forehead. “No, you could never go through with it. And that’s okay. But I can, I can do it.” Arya pulls back with big wide grey eyes. Sansa smiles, sad. “Just- make sure Rickon gets to school in the morning. Alright? Do that for me?”

For one terrible moment, Sansa is sure that Arya is going to cry but then she gets control of her face and nods, quick and sharp: “I’ll go straight to Ma and Dad’s afterwards. I’ll take care of her.”

“I’ll meet you there,” Sansa promises. She turns to skulk away into the night and then, suddenly, Arya throws her arms around her and hugs her tight. “If any one of them hurts you, I’ll kill them,” Arya’s words are harsh and honest.

“Yeah, yeah I know,” Sansa says and hugs back just as tight.

**

A man comes to get Sandor in the night. It is an agent he has never seen before with a serious face and his lips are nothing but a thin line. When he first came to the House, Sandor would have been afraid of such a man. But he has been here for three years and there are not many things that scare him anymore.

The man tells him to get dressed and then leads him through empty hallways into a part of the sprawling building that he has never been to before. It is a part of the building that only true agents of the House allowed into. For a brief moment, Sandor lets himself believe that tonight is the night that they will induct him but he knows that it is not true. Even Yegor has not been inducted yet and what use does the House have for a 13 year old boy, even if he is big for his age?

He is led down a flight of stairs and then a hallway until the agent stops him in front of a door; it is large and iron and there is a faint light seeping out from underneath it. The agent knocks and the door swings wide. Sandor is ushered inside even though the man does not follow him in. The room is smaller than he expected and there is a fireplace at one end of the room and a man in a plush armchair in the other. Yegor stands in the center of the room. He is wearing a look that Sandor has not seen for years; the one he wears when he is mean and scared and preparing himself to fight back against Father.

It makes Sandor very nervous.

He glances at the man in the chair- it is the Kindly Man- and tries to understand why he is here. Maybe they are kicking Yegor and him out of the House; maybe they are going to force Sandor to leave the House and his brother. But then why would the man be smiling? But his brother is not.

They are all silent. Sandor because he is scared, Yegor because he has not been told to speak and the Kindly Man because he does not want to. But when he does want to, he says, “Yegor Ivanovich Clegane. Are you loyal to the House?”

“Yes,” his brother says because he has been asked a question.

“Alexander Ivanovich Clegane. Are you loyal to the House?”

Sandor swallows and even though he is still scared, he says, “Yes.”

The Kindly Man is silent again, his mouth still smiling. Then he says, very firm but very quiet, “You will prove it, both.” He turns his head to look directly at Yegor: “Hurt him.” He turns to Sandor: “Let him.”

Yegor glances to the fireplace that is crackling quietly. He looks like even though he is scared, he is prepared to be cruel.

Later, when Sandor is lying in the infirmary with bandages on his face and pain searing through his mind, Micah will come to his bedside and ask if Sandor was afraid. He will tell Micah no, that he was proud to prove his loyalty to the House of Black and White. Many years later, he will even believe the lie. But as Yegor approaches him looking mean and cruel, Sandor is very scared and for one horrible moment he _hates_ his brother and does not ever want to love him again.

But he will. For many years he will continue to love his brother, until one rainy day in the plains of Kansas, Midas will order Yegor to once again hurt his brother and the Mountain will move like an avalanche towards the Hound and he will not look mean and cruel and scared. He will look blank as if he never cared at all. Then, Alexander Ivanovich Clegane will hate him. Then, he will break his shackles.

But that is many years away and until then, the smoke of his own burning flesh will stay with Sandor, pushed far into the back of his throat and waiting to be breathed out.

**

The john is just slipping a hand up her legs, going for the garter hooks, when a sharp whistle blows from the mouth of the alley. The stranger jumps back and hastily does up his belt, fingers fumbling. Sansa feels a wave of relief that is quickly barreled over with anger. It’d taken her _hours_ to finally work up the courage to approach the john, to let herself smile at some strange man and work out the deal. She’d been so close to that money, god she could almost have tasted that money except-

Heavy steps rush towards them and Sansa pushes away from the wall, brushing her hair back from her shoulders and making sure that her chin is up. There wasn’t any shame in tricking out, she reminds herself. No shame if she really needed the money. And if the cop thinks any different- well.

“And just what do ye think you’re doin’ back here?” the cop says and Sansa blushes deep and dark. Just her luck that it’s Officer Selmy. He isn’t looking at her though. He is staring down the john she’d picked up outside the bar, staring him down like he’s nothing but maggots. Maybe she can just slip away.

She starts to slink off but Officer Selmy’s hand shoots out and snags her by the coat. “And you-” he turns to her and his face goes slack and she knows that he recognizes her even under the garish make-up she’s trussed herself up in.

He glances back and forth between her and the john before letting her go and pushing at the stranger: “Gan’ gone then, get of here. Ye got no business here.” The man doesn’t need to be told twice.

Sansa buttons up her coat fast while Officer Selmy is looking away from her. She is equal parts terrified and angry now. Every part of her is spinning out of control, her mind reeling, trying to find a solution to this mess, trying to think of how to get away from him and to another lousy joint where she could find another lousy john. Officer Selmy turns back to her and his face looks sad.

“Oh Sansa, what would your mam say if she could see ye tonight?” he murmurs like he has any right at all.

That’s when it all becomes sad and desperate and fury for her, because he’s right and he’s wrong because- “It’s for her that I’m out here. She’s dyin’,” she tells him because she knows that once a long time ago, he was sweet on her ma. “This is the only way for me to get money for the medicine.”

“Surely-”

Sansa runs her hand through her hair, feeling wild and hysterical; she’s sick of saying this: “The only way,” she repeats and looks him in the eyes even though she’s starting to cry. “I have borrowed every dollar I can, I have pawned anything I could pawn and gone down to the Bowery and taken blue pictures and all I need is six dollars. _Six dollars_. Am I supposed to let my ma die when all it’ll cost is one bad night? It’s just one bad night,” Sansa pleads and doesn’t even give a thought to pride.

Officer Selmy sucks on his lips and can’t seem to meet her eyes. “Six dollars?” he says more to himself but she nods her head anyway. “Alright,” he looks at her. “C’mon then.” He starts to walk out of the alley and Sansa just stares, knowing her mouth is hanging open.

He glances back, jerks his head: “I’m not gan’ arrest you, not for trying to save your mam. ‘Sides,” he smiles, “I’m off my beat.”

“Then-” she starts, then stops, not sure how to finish.

Officer Selmy walks back towards her, gentle, like she's a wild deer that might startle. Sansa supposes that she might be. “I’ve got some money saved up,” he tells her. “The wife passed away a few years ago and we never had any children. I was just saving it for a rainy day. Ye can have six dollars. It won’t put me out.”

Sansa blinks and it takes a moment to let herself believe this. Things like this- nice things, easy things- they didn’t happen to her. They didn’t happen to people like her- slum-living, money-pinching, scrabbling people like her. Then Officer Selmy tips her chin up and it’s a kind smile and Sansa wants to cry because maybe just this once things turned out the nice way instead of the ugly.

“C’mon then,” he gently pulls her along. “When was the last time you ate?”

Sansa shakes her head; she can’t remember.

“Alright. Six dollars and a hot meal,” Officer Selmy promises her. “How does that sound?”

“Wonderful,” Sansa whispers but really it sounds like a miracle that she's going to have to pay back later.

**

Sandor watches the Winter Soldier sharpen her knives. Hours before, they had sliced through the bones of Soviet defectors and tomorrow they will do the same. For once, Sandor muses, the legend was true; he has never seen a Fury like the Winter Soldier, has never stood so close to chaos.

Her eyes are blank again, her movements methodical, but now Sandor knows better. He’s seen the fire in her eyes.

Sandor cocks his head to the side, hands on the armrests of the musty hotel armchair. The Soldier does not look up. “You are not so empty as they say, are you, Soldier?” he asks although he does not expect a response. “No,” he answers himself. “You burn inside.” He leans forward: he knows, he feels it too.

He considers for a moment how to break through the steel exterior to get at the fire underneath. Not to get close- he has seen the handlers who push too far, has seen them torn limb from limb by the grip of the Soldier’s metal arm. He wants only to feel the embers.

“Did you kill Captain America?” he asks because he has always wondered and perhaps the Winter Soldier, like so many in their profession, suffers from pride, however unlikely. “It has been over 30 years and still no one has claimed the shot.”

Nothing. Then it occurs to him. What tames a beast? A muzzle.

“Take it off,” he gestures to the black mask that has covered the Soldier’s face for decades; the one he has never seen her without. The Winter Soldier’s eyes flash to his. “Show me your face,” he commands, greedy to finally see the beast for what it is.

But the Soldier only stares at him with fire burning sharp. She has stopped sharpening her knives and is holding one in a grip that only a fool would believe was casual. He is too close though to stop now. He is cracking her; he is going to break open the machine and see the fur underneath. Sandor stands, makes himself a threat, takes a step towards her, ready to remove the mask himself.

“Now. Take it off now-” he reaches forward but finds himself slammed against the hotel wall, the breath rushing out of him and a knife at his throat.

“No,” the Winter Soldier speaks fierce with defiance, the sound muffled by the mask pressed to her lips.

“Why?” Sandor challenges because sometimes even he is a fool. “Do you like being their dog?”

The knife is gone from his throat and is buried hilt deep in the plaster by his head. The metal plates of her arm whir. “You are the only hound here,” she spits.

Sandor laughs, gritty and deep, feeling his fangs. “We are both dogs,” he answers her, “but only you crave the leash.”

“Don’t _you_?” she snarls.

For a moment, Sandor is sure she will kill him; her eyes blaze so bright. For a moment, he is sure she will remove the mask. Then, abruptly, she backs away from him and sits back in the hotel chair to finish sharpening her knives. Sandor doesn’t move from the wall. His adrenaline is spiked, both from breaking her steel exterior and from the knowledge that he had come so close to death. He revels in it. He shakes from it.

For a beat, all is still and silent and heavy. Then the Winter Soldier turns to him and he is shocked to see deep pools of sadness in her eyes. A hand, the flesh one, rises to touch the mask. “It is all I have,” she tells him with a voice from far away. “There is nothing else left.”

Sandor stares at her, thrown by the statement, by the longing in the Soldier’s voice. Then her eyes cloud and they turn from sadness to confusion to the empty void once more. She picks up a knife. Sandor walks back to his chair.

Tomorrow they will complete the mission.

**

One day, without looking, not even remembering it at all until she saw it, Sansa found a baseball field in the old lot where the boys used to play stickball. It hit her all over again, in a deep burst of breath, just how much she missed them.

Of course there was a baseball field. This was the built up side of Brooklyn- flowers by the trees and fine grained sand at the end of the slides. Of course there was a baseball field. It used to be just a lot with rusty metal and some dried up grass but there had been so much space and sky that the boys had played stickball there for years; Robb, then Bran, then Rickon. Arya, whenever she could bully the other boys into letting her.

Sansa didn't linger- the hurt was a little deeper than she could bear out where anyone could see so she moved on.

Later, propped up against the punching bag and panting, Sansa couldn't decide if she was glad to have seen the lot at all, if the remembering had been at all worth it.

**

Late into the night, Sansa gasped awake, still choking on Japanese mud and smoke. She felt like she was burning from cold, like she was going up in flames even though her limbs were flash frozen and flaring with pain. She gasped again and went light-headed with the rush of air but it felt so good to breathe that she did it again; big heaping mouthfuls of the stuff. Sandor- he put his hand on the small of her back and she wanted to shout because even that hurt. Everything always hurt _so bad_. Why’d it all have to hurt-

His hand pressed a little harder and Sansa could barely stand it but it jolted the ice out of her like it always did. As soon as she could, as soon as she was melted enough, Sansa jolted out of the bed and fell to the floor. She scrambled away on all fours until there was a wall at her back and she could see Sandor sitting up in bed, watching her and looming. Sansa gulped for air again and wanted to close her eyes but didn’t. No telling what she’d see if she did.

Instead, she focused on Sandor. Late at night like this, she could see how old he really was. Pain lines mixed with scars and flint eyes high over his hard square jaw. He wore his hair down when he slept and it brushed his bare shoulders, covering the lovebite Sansa had given him- she checked the clock- barely two hours ago. Sandor didn’t- he never- there was never anything soft about him. But at night, that was when he came closest.

“Do you remember the first person you killed?” he asked so abruptly that Sansa jerked back, her head knocking against the wall.

“What?” she blurted because just a moment ago she'd thought him soft.

“The first person that you killed. Do you remember?” Sansa stared at him. Still sitting in bed, sheets draped across his hips, hair haphazard and voice sleep-rough, this man asking her-

“No, no, I don’t,” she stammered because it wasn’t really a lie. Not really.

His eyes bore down on her, as crushing a weight as any ice. Sansa looked down, breathed hard. She looked up: “Don’t make me tell you.”  

He shifted on the bed to face her full on. His fists were tightly clenched and Sansa’s stomach dropped, heavy with anger. “You don’t actually want to know,” she spat. “You just want to tell me about yours. You don’t give a damn about the first man I killed.” He stayed real quiet and real still. “So tell me, huh. Just say it. Who’d you first kill, Sandor?” She asked, much more bitter than she meant but damn it, she just wanted to sit in the corner of her lover’s bedroom and hurt as quietly as she could.

Sandor made to get off the bed but Sansa jerked her head at him. He stopped, raised his knees so the sheet tented and rested his arms on his knees. He waited because the bastard could be endlessly patient when he wanted to be, when he pushed his anger down. Sansa wrapped her arms around herself because she could wait too.

He looked away first and all of a sudden, Sansa found that she wouldn’t mind telling him, not if it would help him say the terrible thing that he so desperately wanted to let out. She closed her eyes, saw a flash of- and opened them quickly again and in a rush said, “I fought in the trenches for months and fired my weapon on most of those days but I’m not sure I ever actually killed someone there. I must’ve but I don’t know for sure. But,” and now Sansa closed her eyes and let the image come. It seemed important somehow, honest, that she say it when she could see the man. “He was a middle-aged man, looked close about to my father. Not really old, but not young. And he didn’t- it wasn’t even him or me. He was just some dumb fella who fumbled his pistol and couldn’t get the safety down and I could.” Sansa saw it still; greying hair and squinting like he needed glasses, a slight paunch hanging over his belt. She opened her eyes and didn’t feel any better for having said it. “So that’s it. That’s the first person I really killed.”

Sandor nodded, slow. He hung his head and very, very quietly, in Russian that Sansa could just piece together: “ _My friend. Micah. A test. Orders._ ” Then he sat back on the bed and closed his eyes and didn’t look at her again for the whole night.

**

The Soviet Union is desperate; their world is crashing down around them. This makes the House of Black and White desperate. Otherwise, they would not have ordered such a drastic mission. He and the Winter Soldier are meant to disrupt a peace summit between the most powerful men in the world: the CEOs of oil companies, of pharmaceutical companies and dirty politicians who have had their hands in the mud for decades. They are dug in like tics and together, they can change the world. They can decide if the Soviet Union is no longer profitable.

The mission will be messy, it will be loud. It is going to be hard but it is good to fight by the Soldier’s side again. Their partnership had not lasted long but together, they are well oiled and efficient. It has been years since they have worked together- her loan to Midas has lasted much longer than anticipated. But now they fight together as if time has stood still and nothing has changed.

Same days he looks in the mirror and is scared that that is the truth.

The day of the summit, the world’s greatest men are stuffed into a fortified room in a hotel that is perched on the side of a mountain in the Alps. All staff who have not worked there for two years have been dismissed and all of the rooms have been booked out. They had built themselves a fortress.

The night before, Sandor had been given the ridiculous task of suspending himself from the roof and replacing the pane of bulletproof glass on the only window through which the Winter Soldier could made the impossible shot from the top of a speeding train that will only pass by the hotel once that month.

But the Soldier makes the shot to disrupt all alarms and communications and any peace talk for the Middle East is dissolved.

Sandor meets the Soldier in the forest outside of the hotel and together they press the detonator to the charges that Sandor had placed. It is only for show but the House wanted to remind the world of their power. Desperation had made them gaudy.

The great men stumble out of the rubble of their bomb-proof sanctuary, coughing and choking on dust and debris. The Hound and the Soldier raise their guns and the men fall, roses of blood sprouting from their torsos. Sandor sees a flash of red hair coming from out of the rubble. The little girl is crying, dressed in a flouncy white dress; some powerful man’s daughter. He raises his gun and aims.

“No,” the Winter Soldier whispers. It is her tone that makes him look at her. The Soldier’s eyes are blooming and shocked. She is breathing heavy. She is trembling.

“The House has ordered no witness,” The Hound argues but the Soldier doesn’t even look at him.

The Soldier drops her gun. It sinks deep in the snow. She stumbles forward. She takes a step, a step towards the crying girl. Her hands come up and they undo the clasp of her mask. It falls even heavier than the gun.

“It’s alright,” the Soldier says and kneels in front of the girl. “I’ll keep you safe,” and Sandor’s breath catches because it was in English; flawless, unaccented English.

The Soldier picks the girl up; she’s stopped crying. Sandor stiffens, takes aim at the Soldier. His hand is shaking. He can’t breath. He can’t pull the trigger. He is breathing too fast. He feels a drip down his face; a tear. Teeth clenched, he aims again and the Soldier does not look back and she disappears into the mountain and smoke. The flash of red hair goes with her.

Sandor gasps and he can’t hold the pistol a moment longer. It falls by the Soldier’s. He can’t even look at it, doesn’t even know why. He doesn’t even know why he fumbles the radio, why he stutters when he reports that the Winter Soldier has gone rogue, doesn’t know why he wishes he could have gone with.

**

Sansa stepped out of the bodega, blinked, but didn’t stop walking. She slipped her phone out of her pocket, let a man get in front of her on the sidewalk and walked past the turn that would get her home and followed the man with the rat tattoo on his neck.

She dialed quickly and Agent Snow answered on the first ring. “Hey, Johnny,” she said, “I saw a rat at home. You want me to stop at the bodega, pick up a trap?”

Agent Snow didn’t miss a beat: “No. Keep distance and pursue. Let’s see if we can find the nest. Turn you comm on. We’ll be tracking you.”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll talk to you later,” Sansa hung up. She spared a thought for the schwarma she’d just bought before handing it to a homeless man and getting the Tickler back in sight.

It was a lucky break. In the three months Sansa’s team had been on the case, they’d mostly only been able to catch low tier hustlers. Enough of them had been able to point them to warehouses and drop sights and then, finally, to this man. Their intel was that he was a mid-tier pusher and enforcer. They had limited surveillance on him but if Sansa could track him back to something it’d put them leaps ahead of where they were.

Sansa pulled out her phone, put in her earbuds and went into a slouch; just a girl, not a threat, just a girl going home from work. He seemed to be wandering almost aimlessly for blocks, taking her closer and closer to Queens. She was worried that if he didn’t stop soon, she’d be made. The streets were getting emptier and that always meant more of a risk. At least the night was on her side.

The Tickler took a sudden left and took off at a run.

“Fuck,” Sansa muttered and took off in pursuit. He was fast, much faster than she’d anticipated, but not enough to lose her. She wrangled the shield out of her tote, discarding the bag without a thought. She expected him to make a break for an alley or, if he was really confident, to go up a fire escape.

But he didn’t. Instead, the Tickler dashed across the street and hopped the fence of the Evergreens Cemetery. Which was entirely unexpected. It was a big open space and Sansa wasn’t exactly hiding the shield from him. One throw and he’d be out.

Except it turned out that Sansa and SHIELD had completely underestimated the Tickler. He was a true Parkour traceur- he leaped and rolled and flipped his way through the cemetery and wove through trees and tombstones. And then he threw a knife at her with amazing precision and speed. She barely raised the shield in time.

He took her on a chase all through the cemetery and then through Highland Park where she finally got a clear shot and the bastard somehow dodged it. Sansa scooped the shield back up, not breaking her gait.

“Snow,” she panted, “I think we may have underestimated this guy. I’d put money on him being enhanced.”

“I’m getting the same impression. We’ve got agents closing in on the park. Keep him going. We’ll catch him,” Agent Snow’s voice crackled in her ear.

“Acknowledged.”

He made his mistake in Forest Park; he pulled out a gun and fired off three shots. It cost him time and made him stand still long enough for Sansa to let the shield fly. He took it to the ribs and he stumbled back.

He didn’t go down.

 _The hell is this guy?_ Sansa thought and that was it before the Tickler suddenly rushed her, another knife in hand, his gun lying by her shield.

It was a merciless fight and Sansa found herself on the defensive. The knife hissed through the hair. Her body flowed with each move but so did his. Definitely enhanced. Sansa grappled for her own knife, and from there is was it’s own dance.

Sansa got a grip on him, threw him back and then he flipped just the way that Sandor always did. The Tickler fought exactly like the Hound and _where does a mid-tier pusher learn Systema_. It made her hesitate and that was Sansa’s mistake because in a blink, her knife was gone and the Tickler had her backed against a tree, his blade digging sharp into her gut.

“C’mon, Little Bird,” he grunted, his breath foul, “I wanna hear you scream.” His knife sliced her belly, clean and smooth and Sansa did scream from it but she also brought her knee hard into his gut. He pulled back and it was enough for Sansa to drive her fist into his neck.

“Scream around that,” she told him as he choked for air. “And you might have missed the shield, but the name’s Captain America.” She geared her body for another attack, breathing through the searing pain in her stomach and ignoring the blood squeezing out of her.

Suddenly, the Tickler was yanked back from her, a gloved hand shooting out from the darkness.

Sansa blinked and fell back against the tree. Maybe she was losing more blood than she thought. That or there really was a group of five women in snake themed costumes who were attacking the Tickler. And doing a great job of it. One of the women- decked out in a red catsuit and painted with scales- kicked his knees out and he went down and another woman in light brown wrangled him, tying up his hands with zip-ties.

“Hey thanks,” Sansa said, feeling a little woozy.

Another one, all in black with a green diamond on her back turned to Sansa, a mask covering her eyes but showing off her blood-colored lips. “Of course, Capitán. We would not let such a man into Queens.”

The one in red handed Sansa’s shield to her: “If you’re going to go up against one of Midas’ men, I’d recommend not dropping this.”

Sansa took it and carefully masked her expression of surprise because she _knew_ that voice. She had to bite back a laugh. Arianne Martell: lawyer by day, vigilante by night. She’d bet that one of the other snake women was Sarella Sand.

“I’ll take into consideration,” Sansa said. Sansa pressed a hand to her stomach, trying to put pressure on. “You ladies got names?”

“We are the Serpent Society. And you are in our territory,” Ms. Martell told her. Sansa wondered if she knew that Sansa had recognized her.

Sansa heard the soft padding of feet surrounding them. “You want my recommendation? I’d get out of here. SHIELD isn’t too fond of vigilantes,” Sansa told them.

The Serpent Society glanced at each other. Ms. Martell nodded and they all bled back into the night. Sansa found herself impressed and grateful. Not just for stopping the Tickler but for knowing that Brooklyn had her and Queens had its own protectors.

The Tickler groaned on the ground, and tried to shuffle to his feet. Sansa pushed herself off the tree and planted a foot on his back. Agent Snow and his STRIKE team came out of the shadows and when he saw the downed man, a boyish grin broke out across his face. “I guess you set a trap anyway,” he said as one of his agents hauled the Tickler up, binding him more securely than the Serpents had.

“Couldn’t be helped,” Sansa told him. She watched him take her in, his eyes landing on the gash in her stomach.

“You’re hurt,” he said.

Sansa nodded. “I’ll get to medical. Where’s the van?”

“Over on Forest Park Drive. Can you make it on your own?”

“Sure,” Sansa told him and went off before he could protest. The Tickler was a big catch and he’d be caught up in that.

Sansa felt bad for lying to him but she couldn’t go to medical. Not yet. She had questions digging at her and so she stumbled her way through the park and all the way to Rego Park and up Sandor’s fire escape. The whole way, the pain mingled with the tension in her heart and the throb of adrenaline and she wasn’t sure if she should be furious or terrified. Ms. Martell had said that name and it brought back the memory of Sandor in Red Hook rattling off the facts of his life. She hated that memory, hated knowing that she was going to have to bring it up and break her promise. She hated that she’d have to hurt him.

She tumbled into his apartment with a huff of air, her boots catching on the lip of the window. Her shield clanged against the hardwood and went rolling somewhere into the corner. “Fuck,” Sansa muttered, and pulled her body around so she was sprawled on her back. Panting, Sansa pressed fingers to the slash in her gut and bit off a sharp cry.

“You look like shit,” Sandor told her and she heard him slip a knife back into its sheath. “You need a hand?”

Sansa started to shake her head- stopped at the wave of nausea: “Just gonna stay here for a sec,” she said. Then, because she knew she actually did need to do something about the knife wound, “A first aid kit would be nice, though.”

He nodded and she heard him go back down through the hallway. Clenching her eyes tight, Sansa jerked her body upright in one smooth motion- like ripping off a band aid. She made herself stand and stumble into the kitchen, turning on the light and pulling out the chair. By the time she collapsed into to it, she was starting to feel like she might pass out. Not from blood loss- she’d be fine there, serum working like it should- but from the tumultuous mix of fear and pain and confusion and dread.

Sandor had watched her do all this from the archway of the hall, heavy eyed and like he was shaking off sleep. He held out the kit to her- well stocked and thorough- and she pulled out the scissors to make quick work of her shirt.

“You want me to do that?” he asked, gesturing. “I have a lot of practice taking you out of your clothes.”

“Cute, stud, but you’ve got clumsy fingers,” Sansa told him, not taking her eyes off her work. It was a lie, of course, but her mind was torn between fight and flight and she couldn’t bear the thought of him close right then. Didn’t know what would happen.

He didn’t call her on it though, instead setting out what she’d need to flush the wound and clean it. Sansa gingerly slipped off the remains of her shirt, dropping it to the ground before putting on the medical gloves. Sandor caught her gaze, silent, _are you sure you won’t let me_ -

 _Yes._ He nodded and sat down in the chair across from her. Sandor’s long hair was down and he must have washed it recently because it shined dark. His hooked nose caught the yellow light and Sansa wished that she could put him at ease.

She did want to let him help. She did. But there were too many unknowns and it wasn’t that she didn’t trust him- Sansa Stark would go down trusting Sandor Clegane and it’d be the death of her someday, trusting so blind- but this wasn’t about trust. This was about boundaries and she’d worked hard to set those clear.

After cleaning the wound she reached past the anesthetic he’d left out and for the surgical staples, keeping pressure on. Holding the dispenser in her hand, Sansa lifted up the gauze; the bleeding had already slowed enough where she wasn’t worried about closing it up. She took a breath, slouched down for a better angle and quick and careful as she could, Sansa stapled herself shut. Then it was quick work; new gauze, a bandage, and snapping off the gloves.

“Will you talk now?” Sandor asked, his bad mood gathering like rain clouds. “Tell me why you did not take this to SHIELD medical?” He flung a hand out at the mess in front of them.

“Needed answers first,” Sansa said, and then because it wasn’t actually an emergency, amended herself, “Well, I wanted answers first.”

“From who?”

“From you.”

Sandor sat up straight.

The part of Sansa that liked to tell people she wasn’t a threat, that she was just a girl, just some girl no threat here, just a pretty smile, almost took over. She almost put a sweet light in her eyes, almost softened the lines of her body, anything to make these questions easier. But she wouldn’t. Not for something as important as this.

She met his eyes.

“That day that I ran away from SHIELD and you went back into your programming, I promised myself that I wasn’t going to ask you any more questions. You’ve had enough taken from you and anything I knew about you was going to be something you wanted to give. I’m breaking that promise right now,” Sansa told him, waited a moment. He nodded.

“I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. But Sandor, that day in Red Hook, you said his name, you said you worked for him, so I have to ask, I have to know- who is Midas? And what does he want with my city?”

Sansa couldn’t have predicted the way that Sandor’s pupils would blow up or the way that he would throw himself back from the table, his chair clattering to the floor and an ace bandage getting thrown, leaving a beige trail into the dark of the hallway. She couldn’t have predicted just how fast his hand would go for his knife or how fast he’d scramble away from her.

But it meant that she’d been right to ask. If Midas meant _this_ much, something _this_ big to Sandor, then she’d been right to ask.

“You don’t owe me an answer,” Sansa whispered to the terrified man in the corner, “but I had to ask.”

His laugh was earth-shattering and bone dry. His shoulders shook with spasms of it and Sansa knew better by now than to be afraid of Sandor but in this moment she came very close. His eyes were ragged and his neck thrown so far back that it convulsed around the barks of laughter. In the wildness of all that sound, words pushed themselves out, hysterical with rage, Sandor gagged on the words, “He is the only man worth running from. If Midas wants your city, Лисичка, then you run.”

“And if I won’t?” Sansa asked.

“Then you are a fool,” Sandor answered. “And you will die a fool. You think you have seen evil? You think you have brushed shoulders with it?” He shook his head. “No. Midas has fingers all over the world. Kennedy. South Africa, Brazil. The genocide in Darfur, Rwanda and your towers. SARS, Plague, FIFA. His touch is everywhere and it all becomes gold.”

“What does he want?” Sansa asked.

“Power. Not an Aryan race or to create a communist world; only power and control,” he looked down, mouth twisted in disgust.

Sansa tried to wrap her head around all of that, found herself thinking of the Night King and Craster and finds that it isn’t so difficult to believe. “How does he do it? Who works for him?”

“Anybody he asks. But his own people are the Brave Companions,” Sandor looked back up at her. “They are ruthless, brutal and filth. You ever meet one, you kill them slow. They have not earned anything but that.”

Sansa frowned, thinking about spreading tentacles: “Iron Man and I fought a Brave Companion in July.”

“Please, Sansa, leave this,” the desperation in his voice didn’t surprise her, “Stop the drug, if you can, but leave him. It’ll only get you killed.”

“You know I can’t do that, Sandor,” she told him and something horrible and furious twisted over his face.

“Being Captain America isn’t worth your life. No lie is big enough to be worth your death.”

Sansa’s nostrils flared, her jaw clenched. “It doesn’t matter what my life is worth. The people I’d save-”

Sandor slammed his palms against the table: “Damn it, Sansa! This is not some playground of a Warlock lab and a group of wet-eared mercenaries. It is not even your White Walkers. If you go after Midas and he catches you- and he will- they will torture you, drug you and the only thing left of Sansa Stark will be that fucking serum in your blood. And when you are no longer useful to them, they will kill you.”

“If Midas is so powerful, how did you escape? If it’s so impossible, then how'd you do it?” Sansa pushed. His eyes were wild and Sansa knew she was tearing him to pieces with these questions and she’d never do it for anything less important.

His hand flew to his hair, stretching his scalp back. His breaths were hard and heavy: “You think it was easy? It took me 7 years! 7 years to fight through that damned drug and the torture and my own fucking brother! I tried more times than I can remember and after each time, they’d torture me and wiped my mind! They took my name!”

“What pushed you then! What broke you? What was your line?”

Sandor seemed to curl in on himself and Sansa was astonished to realize that this is what he looked like when he was scared. This memory, it must be raw and dripping: “The mission was to start a fire in a hospital in São Paulo. All those children, and one of them- it reminded me of the, I _remembered_ \- I couldn’t. It was enough. The fire was enough. That was my line.”

Sansa’s lips parted, her heart clenched at the thought of it, at the thought of all that evil wrapped up in one person. God to ask for a thing like that-

“Sandor,” she murmured and was astounded by his bravery when he met her eyes. “You know I have to do this.”

He nodded, numb, resigned, cracked.

“I’d like you by my side but I understand if you can’t,” she said, still soft.

He flinched: “You’re asking me to help kill you.”

She didn’t tell him that it was a thing worth dying for or that she was meant to be dead anyway. Instead, she said, “I know it’s a lot.”

“ _You rip me up,_ ” he whispered, sweet and low and in Russian. But he said it to her face and looking at her and she knew his answer. “I’ll always be at your side. _We belong to each other_.”

 _Yes_ , Sansa thought, _we do_. She’d been resigned to dying for years but she hoped, desperately, that she could spare him that. He had enough demons.

**

After three days of sleep deprivation, someone finally unlocks the door. Sandor is being punished for failing to find the Winter Soldier as quickly as the House wanted. They suspect that Sandor did not want to find the Soldier and the little girl she had taken. Sandor thinks they may be correct.

Sandor knows that they are going to come to his door moments before they do because they turn off the flashing lights and shut down the alarm and for one moment, everything is dark and silent.

The door slams open and the light, steady and yellow, outlines Agent Trigorin. “Come,” the man says, with his automatic trained on the Hound and looking terrified but trying very hard not to show it. Sandor rises and there is vertigo but it passes. He follows Agent Trigorin with his limbs feeling numb and detached from his head like his body doesn’t belong to him. This is not a new feeling.

Agents flank him, surround him, escort him to a secluded part of the facility and to a door that Sandor has seen bodies being dragged out of. He can smell the stink of urine and shit and blood even through the steel door and concrete walls. His sleep-hazy-desperate mind is stabbed through with clear, cold terror. His heart races, thumps, and sweat beads at his temple. The agents don’t follow him inside.

There are two people in the room and he barely recognizes the Winter Soldier. Gone is the proud spine, the rage and fire in her eyes, the harsh, deadly presence of her. She is a broken, crooked, pathetic heap. Her hair shorn too close to her head, it is bloody and scabbing in some places. Naked, a dislocated shoulder, ribs jutting out awkwardly and a bone sticking out of her arm.

There is no mask, but it doesn’t matter. Her whole face is a mess of purple bruises, dried blood, fresh blood, specks of vomit, snot and murky drool. Faceless, still, even when exposed and broken. It is only by her eyes that he knows her, even though they are sucked dry.

The door opens behind him but Sandor doesn’t look away from the Winter Soldier.

There is a sniffle and Sandor knows, with a roil in his stomach, why he is here. At the noise, the Soldier finally lifts her head; body going on alert; turned on and honing in. Grey eyes go from void to filled with hope and dreadful, heavy certainty. The Soldier knows too.

The red-haired girl is shoved forward like a lick of growing flames. She goes directly to the Soldier, drawn, and Sandor wants to reach out and grab her shoulder; save them both the pain, but he doesn’t. He wonders, when he sees the girl pet the Soldier’s arm, what they did for the month before he found them; what bond could have been forged to make a child caress a killer’s arm.

The other man in the room, the torturer, lets it happen for reasons that Sandor wishes he did not understand; a final act of cruelty before he finishes the punishment. It is just a moment, but one more tender than Sandor has ever seen. He doesn’t want to shatter it, doesn’t want to end this beauty that he didn’t know could exist, doesn’t want to destroy something so sweet that it defied impossibility and made the Winter Soldier disobey.

“Now,” the torturer orders, tossing a knife at Sandor’s feet, sure that the Hound will pass this test. The girl doesn’t flinch and the Soldier’s lip trembles but doesn’t look away from the child’s sweet face. Sandor cannot pick up the knife.

“Now,” the order is repeated, furious. It is an order and orders are obeyed. Orders are obeyed but the Winter Soldier did not- the Winter Soldier did not- did not follow orders and a little girl is looking at her with love and it was going to end like things in the House of Black and White always did; pain and death. Unless Sandor does not follow orders.

His whole body trembles.

“Hound,” and this is not a warning. It is a promise and in fear and rage, Sandor picks up the knife, the world spinning around him and the handle seems as if it was oozing into his skin and it’s as if he can hear a crackle and snap of fire deep in the bowels of this concrete, cold room. He steps forward-

“Please,” a desperate woman croaks. Sandor stops because she had said that in-

“Please,” the Winter Soldier begs in English.

“Now,” the torturer yells and shocked by the sound and by his own storm of confusion, rage and pure terror and so, retreating into the familiar, the Hound slits the girl’s throat and then Sandor drops the knife. The proud, lethal woman howls and gets covered in new, wet blood.

**

“Sandor,” she whispered, even though the sun was coming in through the yellow curtains and there was no one around to hear. “Sandor, I love you.”

He rolled over and looked at her, deep.

“Love is for children,” Sandor said and it would have seemed callous and barren except Sansa could read the softness in the lines of his mouth.

“Yeah, maybe. Maybe,” she choked a little on the words, swallowed. “But that don’t make it any less true.”

He kept looking at her, looking hard, looking at her soft; an endless contradiction of a man. Then, whispering because he understood that this conversation couldn’t happen any other way, he said, “I know you want to be loved.”

She blinked back the wetness in her eyes: “Everyone wants to be loved.”

He didn’t say anything for a long time but Sansa knew it was only because what he was going to say was going to be important and those things took time.

“I don’t think I can love.”

“I know.”

“But if I could, Sansa,” their hands came together, “I would love you.”

“I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wanna say hi on tumblr? drolshakes.tumblr.com 
> 
> Comments are lifeblood.


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